Rachuli (geor. “რაჭული ”) is a comic dance from the Western region of Georgia — Racha.

Racha is located on the southern slope of the Caucasus Mountains. This is one of the most important regions of Georgia with a rich history, culture and traditions.

Vakhushti Batonishvili, an 18th-century historian and geographer, writes about the people of Rachin:
“Very strong and hardworking people live in Racha. Not only men work here, but women also take part in any work. I don't think that there are any other hard-working people in Georgia as in Racha; their physique shows their vigor. Of medium height, slightly well-fed, in the body, broad-shoulders...”

Rachin culture is associated with winemaking and hospitality traditions, which largely determined the nature of the Rachuli dance: it is not overloaded with meanings, it is characterized by lightness, playfulness and elements of flirting.

PERHULI

In Georgia, since prehistory, round dances, songs and dances have been the main and constant decoration of festivals and folk entertainments. Similarly, dance and musical artistic activity was already emerging. Every current dance originates from hunting, ritual and ritual dances. As expressions of national characteristics, they reflected even historical events and for certain revealed the people's way of thinking, being and behaving.

Perhuli, perhisa, perhisuli is a round dance, one of the oldest Georgian dances, usually accompanied by a choir.

Proof of the antiquity of round dances is an archaeological find — a silver bowl found in Trialeti in 1938 in the burials of tribal leaders. Academician B. Kuftin, dated to the first half of the 2nd millennium BC, and the twenty-two figures in animal masks and fox tails on it are dressed in tunics. Holding cups in their hands, they perform a religious dance and round dance, a rite of praise in honor of one of the gods.

As for the origin of the term Perhuli itself, it is etymologically related to the word “perhi”/“pehi”, which translates as “leg”. This suggests that before words were added to music, perhuli existed in the form of dance and pantomime — only accompanied by percussion instruments. Today, perhuli has three main components: words (text), melody, and movements.

Rachin perhules differ in meaning and significance: hunting perhules, for the glory of astral bodies, religious and ritual, military (combat), patriotic, and economic. But unfortunately, among the surviving perhules in Racha, we do not find any religious, ritual and patriotic places. They're forgotten today.

With a few exceptions, Rachuli Perhuli is mostly round in shape. The peculiarity of the shape is distinguished by the “Zhuzhuna” perhuli, which is more like a perchisa (semicircle).

The position of the hands of the dancers in Rachuli Perhuli may be different. One option is the hands of the dancers on each other's shoulders, the second is that the performers hold hands “palm to hand”, or the round dancer can hold on to their neighbors' belts on the right and left.

As for specific Rachin perhuli, we know that Racha, like Svaneti, has preserved the Amirani circular perhula. In its own sense, he is a hunter. We see this perhula both in Racha and in Svaneti. The lyrics in the songs vary in these regions, but the leg movements are identical.

Racha is also rich in other perhuli content.

The household perhule “erthel tsiskvilshi tsasvelad” (“erthel tsiskvilshi tsasvelad”) represents a woman's mischief and her greedy character. The plot of “Tamar Kali” revolves around a fictional story about how a certain Tamar was kidnapped by Circassians. Perhuli tells the story of the kidnapping of Eristavi's wife.

Of interest are “Digorsa dashdnen vizirebi” (“Digorsa dashdnen vizirebi”), and “Digori and Basiani” (Digori and Basiani) combat danders.

Digori is bordered by Racha to the north, while Basiani is located in southwestern Tao in southern Georgia. The Battle of Basian took place in 1204 during Queen Tamar's reign. It is not entirely clear what is the connection between Digori and Basiani, mentioned in Perhuli's text.

It can be assumed that Digori should be replaced by Didgori — a resting place for kings near Tbilisi, where the legendary Battle of Didgori took place in 1121.

According to legends, despite the combat content of the text, Perhuli performed “magla mtas modga” (“magla mtas modga”) at almost every festival in Racha. In 1912, Akaki's trip to Racha-Lechkhumi became a national holiday. As can be seen from the documentary film shot by filmmaker Vasil Amashukeli, a festival was held in honor of this, where perhuli were performed. It's hard to say which one, because the film is silent, but the steps are so similar to those from “” that it's hard to doubt that it's this particular perhula.

DANCING

In addition to perhuli, various kinds of dances were also popular in Racha. After daily work, young people gathered at the meeting place in the evening. In Racha, this gathering place is called “Sanakhsho”. This is a village square or a relatively wide dirt street. The dances that were performed here are not characterized by complex and well-organized movements. They are more free and playful. Such performances were called “huge chogro”.

Agriculture plays an important role in the lives of Rachin residents. The harvest depends on weather conditions. Based on this, one of the traditions associated with the desire to make rain is interesting.

During the drought, several young people gathered. One of them was chosen as “Gonja”, bared (except for his knee-length underwear, he wasn't supposed to wear anything) and coated in black. He was given a long stick, which had the iconic meaning of a “sacred” staff. With such equipment, the Gonja participants went home and, entering the yards, hummed: “Gonja” came to the doorstep, burning, singing: God will give us rain.” At this time, the landlord or family member was sneaking up from behind and drenching him with water from a large vessel, and the Gonja defended himself with a staff, hitting anyone who came to hand. The whole event was accompanied by songs and dances.

Moving on to the modern stage dance “Rachuli”, it should be noted that it was based on both traditional Rachin Perhuli and vocabulary from Rachin's comic dances.

We owe the appearance of Rachuli to a famous dancer — David Skhirtladze, originally from the Ambrolauri district of Racha. Skhirtladze collected the most typical dance moves for Rachi, which later formed the basis for the dance. He mainly addressed the older generation, people who still remembered how their fathers and grandfathers danced. Everything was done to most accurately convey the originality of Rachin dance culture.

An interesting story is connected with the musical design of the number. David found his father's comic poems “Tashi Bicho, Giorgun”, which were then set to folk music and adorned the Rachuli dance.

Rachuli appeared on stage relatively recently, in 2000. It was masterfully performed by the Georgian State Ensemble “Rustavi”.

Recently, the Rachuli dance has become very popular on the Georgian stage. It is very popular with the Georgian people and is performed at almost all festive events.

Often, they do not use perhules in the stage version, but only leave them to dance.

Many ensembles have various variations of this dance in their repertoire. Moreover, there is a new vocabulary in dance, based on the movements we already know. Therefore, the variations of the Rachuli dance are sometimes very different from each other. A characteristic feature of this dance is everyone's favorite melody, which Rachi performs differently in different places.

Like other areas of material culture, clothing reflects the nature of the people's work, their artistic tastes, and the social differences of society. Thus, it may indicate the religious or professional affiliation of a group, the ethical norms adopted among a given ethnic group, as well as religious or professional affiliation. Folk clothes, on the one hand, have great unity, and on the other hand, they have certain local features. General clothing often coincides with the boundaries of an ethnic group (or ethnographic group).

For the first half of the 19th century, we do not have historical materials that give an idea of the clothes of the Rachins. But there are sources of information describing the costume of the inhabitants of Racha in the second half of the 19th century.

The women's Rachin costume was different from that of Georgian women in other districts. Rachinka's clothes consisted of a red shirt (peranga) with pants, a colorful akhalukha (sagule) with a straight neckline on the chest, and long, narrow sleeves with slits. The sagules were girded with a woolen belt with a copper buckle and a long colorful apron with a small cape pocket (tsinsapari) was put on top. Chokhi (kaptara) outerwear had long folding sleeves with slits and an open front bodice, which, like the sides of the garment, was trimmed with red edging.

The described women's costume was typical for two villages in Gororachin — Gebi and Chiora. Its originality was noted by M. A. Shostak, who was in Gebi in the early 19th century: “Women's suits are colorful and not at all similar to Georgian ones; the yellow color of hats stands out sharply.”

The clothes of the population of the other part of Racha, Nizhnyaya, were similar to those of Georgia, in particular Imereti. Middle-income men wore underwear (shirt and pants) made from chintz, akhalukh from cheap fabric, and chokha from local or Ossetian cloth. A felt or lamb hat served as a headdress. In winter, they wore a burka and a hat.

Women's stage costumes most often use such items of clothing as a dress, a cinsapari (apron), and a kerchief.
Men's stage costume consists of a shirt (akhalukha) and pants.

Based on knowledge about the peculiarities of the Rachin costume, you can come up with your own version of the stage costume and create a more vivid and interesting image of the Rachins than the one that is established on stage now.