The Georgian Symbol of WWII Victory

This study examines Meliton Kantaria’s life and symbolic status as a Georgian Victory Banner‑bearer at the Reichstag in 1945. Drawing on contemporary press, archival photographs and commemorative practices, it traces Kantaria’s wartime deed, postwar recognition, later hardships during the war in Abkhazia, and contested memory in international media. The paper argues that Kantaria’s biography encapsulates Georgia’s fraught twentieth‑century trajectory – occupation, marginalisation, and renewed independence – and assesses how national identity, photographic representation and political discourse have shaped his legacy.