The Grapevine Cross (Georgian: ჯვარი ვაზისა, Jvari Vazisa) also known as the Georgian cross or Saint Nino's cross, is a major symbol of the Georgian Orthodox Church, dating from the 4th century AD, when Christianity became an official religion in the kingdom of Iberia (Kartli).
It is recognisable by the slight drooping of its horizontal arms. Traditional accounts credit Saint Nino, a Cappadocian woman who preached Christianity in Iberia (Georgia) early in the 4th century, with this unusual shape of the Georgian cross. The legend has it that she received the grapevine cross from the Virgin Mary (or, alternatively, she forged it herself on the way to Mtskheta) and secured it by entwining with her own hair. Nino came with this cross on her mission to Georgia. The familiar representation of that cross, with its peculiar drooping arms, did not appear until the early modern era, however.
According to traditional accounts, the cross of St Nino was kept at the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral in Mtskheta until 541. During the Persian invasions, it was taken to Armenia and stayed there until David IV of Georgia recovered the Armenian city of Ani from Muslims in the 1124, and brought the cross to Mtskheta. King Vakhtang III of Georgia (1303-1307) enshrined the cross in a special envelope, decorated with the scenes from St. Nino's life. During the 17th-18th centuries, when Georgia was subjected to a series of Persian and Ottoman invasions, the cross was taken to safer areas, namely to Gergeti Trinity Church, then to Ananuri in highland Georgia, and eventually to Moscow. In 1801, a Georgian emigre prince George Bagration presented it to the Russian Tsar Alexander I who returned it to Georgia in 1802 after Georgia's incorporation within the Russian Empire. Since then, the cross has been preserved in the Sioni Cathedral in Tbilisi, Georgia.[1]