Arbo, Georgia

Arbo houses a memorial museum of the 19th-century Georgian writer Niko Lomouri, a native of the village, and two churches of Saint George, one, a single nave basilica, built in the 10th century, and the other, a crossed domed design, built in the 19th century.[3]

The foundation of Arbo is attributed by popular memory to Queen Tamar around 1184. It is closely linked with the late 10th-century church of St. George, which is associated with the surviving tradition of an August feast of that saint, known as arbooba.[4] The village is mentioned in the 18th-century geography by Prince Vakhushti, several documents from that century, and a travelogue of Johann Anton Güldenstädt (1787–1791).[5]

The village lies immediately adjacent to the conflict zone of South Ossetia. During the August 2008 Russo-Georgian War, the village was briefly occupied by the Russian and South Ossetian forces, resulting in the temporary displacement of 60-65% of Arbo's population. According to the Georgian Ombudsman's Office, Arbo saw an "incursion of armed bands, robbery,... as well as violence towards peaceful population."[6] In the post-war years, Arbo was one of those villages that, Georgia said, was the scene of the "border demarcation works" conducted by the Russian military in South Ossetia in 2010[7] and reconnaissance flights of Russian helicopters and drones over the ceasefire line in 2014.[8]

• Shida Kartli