Anthony II (secular name — Prince Teimuraz Bagrationi; 8 January 1762, Tbilisi — 21 December 1827, Nizhny Novgorod) was the last Catholicos-Patriarch of Eastern Georgia, holding the throne from 1788 to 1811. After the abolition of the autocephaly of the Georgian Orthodox Church, he spent his final years in Nizhny Novgorod, where he was also buried.[4]
Origin and church career
Teimuraz Bagrationi was born into the family of King Heraclius II of Kartli-Kakheti. He received his theological education at the Tbilisi Theological Seminary, where in 1782 he took monastic vows and was ordained a hierodeacon. In 1783 he visited Russia as part of a Georgian embassy. In 1784, his episcopal consecration took place at the court church of the Summer Palace at Tsarskoye Selo in the presence of Empress Catherine II: the empress presented the newly consecrated Bishop of Ninotsminda with a precious panagia. That same year he was elevated to the rank of Metropolitan of Alaverdi.[4]
In 1788, after the death of Catholicos-Patriarch Anthony I, the twenty-five-year-old metropolitan was elected Catholicos-Patriarch of Georgia.[4]
Abolition of autocephaly and exile to Nizhny Novgorod
On 18 January 1801, a manifesto on the incorporation of Kartli-Kakheti into Russia was proclaimed in St. Petersburg. On 30 January 1811, Emperor Alexander I approved a report of the Most Holy Synod establishing a new administration for the Georgian Orthodox Church: autocephaly and patriarchal dignity were abolished, and the head of the Georgian clergy became the Metropolitan of Mtskheta and Kartli, bearing the title of Exarch of Georgia and member of the Russian Orthodox Church. On 21 June 1811, at a meeting of the Most Holy Synod, Anthony was stripped of the rank of Catholicos-Patriarch.[4]
After his removal from the primatial ministry, Metropolitan Anthony retired to Nizhny Novgorod. Nearby, in the village of Lyskovo, lived descendants of the Georgian King Vakhtang VI, who supported him for the rest of his life.[4]
Burial in Nizhny Novgorod
Metropolitan Anthony died on 21 December 1827 and was buried in the Annunciation Cathedral of Nizhny Novgorod. In 1841 his remains were transferred to the Transfiguration Monastery of the Nizhny Novgorod Diocese.[4]
Sources
- azbyka.ru — Anthony II, Catholicos-Patriarch of Eastern Georgia (Bagrationi Teimuraz, Prince of Kartli-Kakheti), Russian Orthodox Hierarchs, 992-1892 (Volumes I-III)… — Metropolitan Manuil…
- mapy.com
- nn.aif.ru — From Hermogenes to Kirill. Patriarchs connected with the Nizhny Novgorod land (archived)
- mapy.com