Who is this programme for?: Georgian may only be studied as a minor element with other major subjects. The Caucasus is one of the most complex ethno-linguistic regions in any part of the world, the indigenous languages there alone totalling almost forty. The Caucasian languages are traditionally divided into three families: South Caucasian (Kartvelian), North-West Caucasian and North-East Caucasian (incorporating Nakh and Daghestanian). The four South Caucasian languages (Georgian, Mingrelian, Laz and Svan) are certainly unrelated to their northern neighbours and, as far as we can tell, to any other known language. Only Georgian from the Caucasian families has a history of writing ante-dating the nineteenth century. In fact, the quite unique Georgian script (and there have been three variants over the centuries) seems to have been devised at the end of the fourth century AD, giving us some fifteen centuries of literary tradition.

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