Queen Tamar Bridge

The History of Queen Tamar Bridge

In the Middle Ages, a sparsely populated feudal city existed where the village of Chalatke now stands. According to legend, Tamar passed through this city with her entourage, but could not find a bridge to cross the river. The King ordered the construction of a bridge, and local workers used a mixture of stones and a mortar composed of lime and eggs to build the bridge. Some scholars even suggested that goat’s milk may have been used in place of water when constructing the bridge.

This unorthodox creation has nonetheless stood the stand of time, and has served the people faithfully for 800 years. Some local legends even say that gold was put into the foundations of the bridge so that, if  the bridge would ever be  destroyed, it could have been rebuilt using these funds.

Queen Tamar Bridge is one of just a handful of multi-span bridges that have been preserved in Georgia. It is an impressive, 40-metre-long structure whose foundations have rounded run-off channels to ensure flood waters do not bring down the bridge.

Over the centuries, Queen Tamar Bridge has undergone renovations on two separate occasions, and remains in regular use today.