The Georgian National Museum now houses a 10th-century unique manuscript by John Zosimos, a well-known Georgian calligrapher, author, translator, and bookbinder-monk.

Bidzina Ivanishvili, the founder and Honorary Chair of the ruling Georgian Dream party, acquired the manuscript for £1.25 million at Christie’s auction in London on June 11.

The Christie’s auction said the manuscript contains the earliest textual witnesses of the Gospels in the nearest dialect of Aramaic to that spoken by Jesus, composed within a living tradition based in the Holy Land.

The palimpsest is overwritten with Georgian text written by the famed calligrapher John Zosimos and survives here in his 10th-century binding from St Catherine’s Monastery in Sinai, the earliest known signed, dated and localisable binding.