Apart from the historians , Iberia 's conversion is of greater interest during decades of debates , to the Astronomy scholars - who maintain that there is a high possibility that the '' total solar eclipse '' of AD 319 , May 6 is the exact date of the Georgian conversion , an eclipse that actually happened in the 4th century and reached eastern Georgia , and this " eclipse hypothesis " is not new . An eclipse per model ΔT ≈ 7500 with '' solar azimuth angle '' being about 290 ° would make King Mirian and his fellow hunters - or royal entourage - witness the totality of it , but not the townspeople nearby . The visibility conditions for the king on the Tkhoti mountain could have been similar to the Solar eclipse of July 11 , 2010 as seen at sunset from the mountainous terrain of Patagonia . During the eclipse of AD 319 , observers at lower elevations near Mtskheta , would have seen the sky grow prematurely dark and then slightly brighter , without the Sun reappearing over the horizon . At higher elevations nearby such as where the king might have been , totality of an eclipse may indeed have been a remarkable sight . L. V. Morrison and F. R. Stephenson according to their '' geophysical '' model ΔT ≈ 7450 ± 180 ° , do not contradict this scenario and an intriguing possibility , but it remains an open question whether the ancient and medieval written accounts are trustworthy , if they are really based on actual facts
Solar eclipse of July 11 , 2010
Solar eclipse of July 11, 2010
Christianization of Iberia