A team from Georgia, which was here last month, and the ASI found the relics from under the epistle window of the Augustin complex in Old Goa.
PANAJI: “It can not get bigger than this,” was the spontaneous response of an upbeat team of Archeological Survey of India (ASI). Eager as they are about the latest discovery — a long bone reportedly belonging to Queen Ketevan —they are awaiting a confirmation from a DNA test, that the relics are indeed hers.
A team from Georgia, which was here last month, and the ASI found the relics from under the epistle window of the Augustin complex in Old Goa. For the Georgian team, it means they have finally found the remains of the patron saint of Georgia, which was a part of the erstwhile USSR.
“It’s a huge discovery for us,” said the ASI team which is currently waiting for the DNA report from Georgia. “We will then send the DNA samples from the bone fragments we found to the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology at Hyderabad to match the samples,” the team said.
If the results match, the long search for Queen Ketevan's relics in Goa will finally be over. An archeologist told DNA that the ASI had received an e-mail last week from David Karidze, a member of the Georgia team, confirming that the paperwork for the tests was complete. Karidze along with historian Dr Alexander Nonshvili and five others had spent four days in Goa from November 1, during which they had toured the Augustin complex and had meetings with ASI.
Queen Ketevan, who died a martyr, was bestowed sainthood in the 17th century. She was taken prisoner for ten long years by the emperor of Persia Shah Abbas I after his army conquered Georgia in 1613. Her refusal to convert to Islam and join the emperor's harem led to her being tortured and strangled to death in 1624. Two Augustinian friars in Shiraz, who were the queen's confessors, unearthed the remains of the queen and hid them. In 1627, part of these remains, the right arm and palm, was brought to Goa and kept in the black box on the second window of the epistle side in the Chapter chapel in St Augustine complex.
Since 1988, several attempts have been made to find the relics of the queen from the the Chapter Chapel, now in ruins, and a part of the Augustin complex. The ASI began to look for reference in books and came across the documentation of Silva Rego, which quoted the Augustinian friars who had given the exact location of the bones. “The ASI began scientific clearance and found the bone fragments on which we will conduct a DNA test after we get a report from Georgia,” an ASI official said.
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