BRAMS Institute
Doctor of International Journalism / Founder & CEO
Tbilisi/Georgia
nadareimaia@gmail.com
Abstract
To secure the international recognition and respect due to Georgia, it is necessary not only to strengthen its contemporary standing but also to restore historical justice. One important aspect of this is resolving the dilemma around Tamar of Georgia’s official title – rendered in many modern English sources as “Queen Tamar” – when Georgian sources style her as king and king of kings. It is misleading for English to render a female monarch who held kingly office simply as “queen.”
Georgian legal thought understands the term from a functional, office based perspective. English usage tends to mark “king” or “queen” by the sovereign’s sex and often overlooks the governing office that the title denotes. English therefore uses qualifiers such as king regnant and queen regnant (to denote a sovereign who rules in their own right) and king consort and queen consort (to denote a spouse of the sovereign), thereby distinguishing sovereign status from spousal status. This convention is so entrenched that, despite the existence of powerful female rulers (Æthelflæd, Mary Tudor, Elizabeth I, Mary II, Anne Stuart, Victoria, Elizabeth II), their formal designation is queen regnant rather than king.
It is particularly misleading when non Georgian commentators assert that Georgian lacked concepts equivalent to “regnant” and “consort,” and that this supposed lexical gap somehow explains Tamar’s being styled “king.” Such claims overlook the historical evidence: Tamar was crowned with royal robes and insignia twice – once as co-ruler alongside King George III and again after her father’s death – and her official titulature affirms kingly authority (for example, rendered in Georgian as “king” and “king of kings”). Rather than resorting to adjective qualifiers as in English, Georgian legal linguistic practice treats a person who rules a kingdom and is crowned accordingly as a king, irrespective of sex. This usage reflects both the legal function and the semantic intention of the term in Georgian.
There is also a conceptual awkwardness in the English phrase “queen regnant”: regnant simply means “one who reigns,” so the compound risks tautology if used to avoid calling a ruling woman “king.” From a legal, historical and linguistic perspective, it is questionable to apply “queen” to a ruler who exercised the full authority of a king over a kingdom rather than over a queendom.
The Georgian linguistic legal approach was not merely progressive in the late twelfth century; it remains comparatively uncommon globally. Only a few polities have adopted a parallel, office centred understanding of royal titles that de emphasises gender. This study examines exceptional cases in which gendered title distinctions were set aside in practice, despite prevailing patriarchal norms and social prejudice. Finally, I propose a linguistic solution intended to preserve the political status and dignity of King Tamar in translation.
Keywords: Georgia, Tamar of Georgia, Gender, Monarch, Translation, England, History, Legal Tradition.