The Origins of Stalin’s Last Name: The Djugashvili Controversy
In my detailed article addressing the question of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s alleged jewish origins. I mentioned Maurice Pinay’s contention – echoed in the early 1990s by Revilo Oliver in the pages of Wilmot Robertson’s ‘Instauration’ – concerning Stalin’s surname Djugashvili meaning ‘Son of Djou’ and that ‘Djou’ was populated by jews. (1)
To wit:
'At the head of the names stands Stalin himself, who for a long time was regarded as a Georgian of pure descent. But it has been revealed, that he belongs to the Jewish race; for Djougachvili, which is his surname, means “Son of Djou,” and Djou is a small island in Persia, whither many banished Portuguese “Gypsies” migrated, who late settled in Georgia.
Today it is almost completely proved, that Stalin has Jewish blood, although he neither confirmed or denied the rumours, about which mutterings began in his direction.' (2)
The argument made by Pinay and those who have followed him lays particular stress on the meaning of the surname 'Djougachvili' or 'Djugashvili', which in Pinay’s opinion means 'Son of Djou' and in the precursor argument 'Son of [a] Jew'.
Now the island of Djou doesn’t in fact exist, but the closest I can find is the island of Djerba off of Tunisia near the city of Tripoli that was part of the Ottoman Empire (= ‘Persia’) from 1503 AD. (3) This island has had a sizeable jewish population for more than 2,500 years (4) and is the subject of pilgrimages by modern jews. (5)
Therefore it is the likeliest identification for island that Pinay refers to as ‘Djou’.
However there is no evidence whatsoever that ‘Djugashvili’ means ‘Son of Djou’ or ‘Son of Djerba’ let alone that this in turn means ‘Son of Jew’ in Georgian.
The word 'Djuga' (or 'Dzhuga') in old Georgian does not mean 'jew' or 'Djou'/’Djerba’, but rather it roughly equates 'iron' or 'steel'. The old Georgian words for jew were actually 'Ebraeli' or 'Uriya', which bear absolutely no resemblance to 'Djuga' or 'Dzhuga'. It also makes sense of Joseph Djugashvili’s later adoption of his famous nom de guerre ‘Stalin’ aka ‘Man of Steel’.
References
(1) https://karlradl14.substack.com/p/was-joseph-stalin-jewish
(2) Maurice Pinay, 2000, [1967], ‘The Plot against the Church’, 4th Edition, Christian Book Club of America: Palmdale, p. 67
(3) Helen Nicholson, 2001, ‘The Knights Hospitaller’, 1st Edition, The Boydell Press: Woodbridge, p. 122
(4) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djerba#History_of_Djerba's_Jewish_community ; https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/05/pilgrimage-tunisian-island-djerba-highlights-ancient-jewish-heritage ; https://globalnews.ca/news/8838207/jewish-community-tunisia-djerba-antisemitism/
(5) http://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/joining-the-djerba-pilgrimage/ ; https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/05/pilgrimage-tunisian-island-djerba-highlights-ancient-jewish-heritage