Georgia

On the eastern shore of the Black Sea, sheltered by the Caucasus, the kingdom of Colchis emerged in the lands of western Georgia. Famed in classical antiquity for its wealth, Colchis was the country to which Greek legend sent Jason and the Argonauts in quest of the Golden Fleece, the home of the sorceress Medea and her father King Aeëtes. Behind the myth lay a real Bronze and Iron Age society skilled in metalwork, whose riverbeds were panned for gold using fleeces laid in the streams, a practice many scholars connect to the legend itself. By the sixth century BCE the region traded with the Greek world and hosted Greek colonies along its coast.

To the east, in the lands of modern Kartli and Kakheti, arose the kingdom of Iberia around the late fourth or early third century BCE, centred on the city of Mtskheta at the confluence of the Mtkvari and Aragvi rivers. Iberia developed a distinct Georgian society with its own monarchy, nobility and culture, mediating between the great powers that pressed on the Caucasus. Both kingdoms were drawn into the orbit of Rome: the Roman general Pompey campaigned in the region in 65 BCE, and Colchis and Iberia became contested borderlands between Rome and the Iranian empires of the Parthians and Sasanians.

These ancient realms laid the territorial and cultural foundations of Georgia. Colchis, later known to the Romans as Lazica, and Iberia together covered much of the modern country, and Mtskheta, the Iberian capital, would remain the spiritual heart of the Georgian nation. The fabled wealth of Colchis and Iberia was known to the ancient Greeks, and the memory of the Golden Fleece endured as a national emblem. It was in Iberia, in the early fourth century, that one of the most consequential events of Georgian history would unfold: the coming of Christianity.

Turning points

1. c. 6th century BCEFormation

   Kingdom of Colchis flourishes

   On the Black Sea coast of western Georgia, the wealthy kingdom of Colchis, the land of the Golden Fleece in Greek myth, traded with the Greek world and developed a society famed for its metalwork.

   [2] [1]

2. c. late 4th century BCEFormation

   Kingdom of Iberia founded

   The eastern Georgian kingdom of Iberia emerged in the lands of Kartli, centred on Mtskheta, forming a distinct monarchy that would become the core of the Georgian state.

   [3] [1]

3. 65 BCEWar & Rupture

   Pompey campaigns in the Caucasus

   The Roman general Pompey campaigned in Colchis and Iberia, drawing the Georgian lands into the long contest between Rome and the Iranian empires over the Caucasus.

   ↗See the data

   [1] [2]

In the early fourth century a woman from Cappadocia named Nino came to Iberia and preached the Christian faith. According to Georgian tradition she healed the sick, converted Queen Nana, and finally won over the pagan king Mirian III, who, lost in darkness while hunting, vowed to follow Nino's God if he found his way home. Around 337 Mirian declared Christianity the state religion of Iberia, making the Georgian kingdom one of the earliest states in the world to adopt the faith, only after Armenia and at roughly the same time as the Roman Empire under Constantine. St Nino, venerated as 'Equal to the Apostles' and Enlightener of Georgia, became the country's most beloved saint.

Christianity reshaped Georgian civilisation. At Mtskheta the great Svetitskhoveli Cathedral rose over the supposed burial place of Christ's robe, and the hilltop Jvari church looked down on the city; both survive today among the Historical Monuments of Mtskheta inscribed by UNESCO. A distinct Georgian alphabet was developed to render scripture and liturgy in the national tongue, and monasteries became centres of learning and translation. The Georgian Orthodox Church grew into a pillar of national identity that would outlast every empire to rule the country.

Politically the Christian centuries were turbulent. Iberia and the western kingdom of Lazica were fought over by Byzantium and Sasanian Persia, and from the seventh century Arab armies brought Islam to the Caucasus, establishing an emirate at Tbilisi. Yet Georgian princely houses endured in the mountains and valleys, and a new dynasty, the Bagrationi, steadily gathered power in the south and west. Their rise culminated in 1008, when Bagrat III united the eastern and western Georgian lands into a single kingdom for the first time, the foundation on which the golden age would be built.

Turning points

1. c. 337Religion

   Iberia adopts Christianity

   Through the preaching of St Nino, King Mirian III of Iberia adopted Christianity as the state religion, making Georgia one of the world's oldest Christian states.

   [4] [5] [1]

2. 7th centuryWar & Rupture

   Arab conquest and the Emirate of Tbilisi

   Arab armies brought Islam to the Caucasus and established an emirate at Tbilisi, beginning centuries in which Georgian princely houses contested Muslim and Byzantine power.

   ↗See the data

   [1]

3. 1008Formation

   Bagrat III unites Georgia

   Bagrat III of the Bagrationi dynasty united the eastern and western Georgian lands into a single kingdom, laying the foundation for the medieval golden age.

   [1] [6]

Figures of the era

The golden age was inaugurated by David IV, called Aghmashenebeli, 'the Builder', who reigned from 1089 to 1125. Inheriting a kingdom battered by the Seljuk Turks, David reformed the army and administration, curbed the great nobles and the church, and went on the offensive. At the Battle of Didgori in 1121 his forces shattered a far larger Seljuk coalition, and the following year he recaptured Tbilisi, which had been under Muslim rule for centuries, making it the royal capital. Widely regarded as the greatest of Georgian rulers and canonised by the Georgian Orthodox Church, David founded the monastery and academy of Gelati near Kutaisi, a masterpiece of the age and a centre of science and learning now inscribed by UNESCO.

The zenith of Georgian power and prestige came in the reign of Queen Tamar, from 1184 to 1213. Proclaimed co-ruler by her father George III and crowned in her own right, she was given the title mepe, 'king', as the first woman to rule Georgia outright. Tamar overcame aristocratic opposition, expanded the realm until it stretched from the borders of Azerbaijan to Cherkessia and from Erzurum to Ganja, and presided over a pan-Caucasian empire whose trade and culture flourished. Her reign became a byword for Georgian greatness, and she too was canonised by the church.

The golden age was as much a cultural as a military achievement. The court fostered architecture, scholarship and above all poetry, and around 1200 Shota Rustaveli composed Vepkhistqaosani, 'The Knight in the Panther's Skin', the Georgian national epic, a poem of love, friendship and chivalry traditionally associated with Tamar's court. The towers and villages of Upper Svaneti, preserved by mountain isolation, and the cathedrals of Mtskheta and Gelati belong to this era of confidence. The age ended abruptly when the Mongols swept into the Caucasus around 1230, beginning the long fragmentation of the kingdom.

Turning points

1. 1121War & Rupture

   Battle of Didgori

   David IV the Builder defeated a much larger Seljuk Turkish coalition at Didgori west of Tbilisi, a decisive victory that broke Seljuk power in the Caucasus.

   ↗See the data

   [8] [1]

2. 1122Politics & Power

   Tbilisi recovered and made capital

   David IV recaptured Tbilisi from Muslim rule, ending centuries of the emirate and establishing the city as the royal capital of a reunited Georgia.

   [1] [8]

3. 1184–1213Politics & Power

   Reign of Queen Tamar

   Tamar, titled mepe ('king'), brought Georgia to the height of its power and prestige, ruling a pan-Caucasian realm and presiding over a cultural golden age.

   [9] [1]

4. c. 1200Culture & Ideas

   Rustaveli's national epic

   Shota Rustaveli composed 'The Knight in the Panther's Skin', the Georgian national epic, the supreme literary achievement of the golden age and a classic of world literature.

   [10]

Figures of the era

From the thirteenth century Georgia was battered by waves of conquest. The Mongols subjugated the country, and in the late fourteenth century the armies of Timur (Tamerlane) devastated it repeatedly. The unified kingdom dissolved into rival monarchies and principalities, Kartli, Kakheti and Imereti among them, and the lesser lords of regions such as Samtskhe and Mingrelia. Caught between two great Muslim empires, Georgia became a battlefield: the Ottoman Turks pressed from the west and the Safavid and later Persian shahs from the east, exacting tribute, deporting populations and installing client rulers, even as the Georgian church and language preserved a sense of nationhood.

By the eighteenth century the eastern kingdom of Kartli-Kakheti, under King Erekle II, sought a Christian protector against Persian and Ottoman power. In 1783 Erekle concluded the Treaty of Georgievsk with Catherine the Great, by which the Russian Empire guaranteed Georgia's territorial integrity and the continuation of the Bagrationi dynasty in return for control over its foreign affairs. The protection proved hollow: in 1795 the Persian shah Agha Mohammad Khan sacked Tbilisi, and Russia did not intervene in time. The alliance ultimately served Russian expansion rather than Georgian survival.

In 1801 the Russian emperor Paul I, and then Alexander I, unilaterally annexed Kartli-Kakheti, abolishing the Georgian monarchy in breach of the 1783 treaty's terms. Over the following decades Russia absorbed the remaining Georgian principalities one by one, completing its conquest of the country by the 1860s and 1870s and reducing the ancient kingdom to provinces of the empire. The Bagrationi dynasty was deposed and the autocephaly of the Georgian church was suspended, even as Russian rule brought roads, railways and the growth of Tbilisi as a Caucasian capital.

Turning points

1. 1386–1403War & Rupture

   Invasions of Timur

   The armies of Timur (Tamerlane) repeatedly devastated Georgia, accelerating the breakup of the kingdom into rival principalities amid Mongol and Turkic pressure.

   ↗See the data

   [1] [11]

2. 24 July 1783Politics & Power

   Treaty of Georgievsk

   King Erekle II of Kartli-Kakheti placed his kingdom under Russian protection, ceding control of foreign affairs in exchange for guarantees of its integrity and dynasty against Persia and the Ottomans.

   [12] [11]

3. 1801Colonisation

   Russia annexes Kartli-Kakheti

   The Russian Empire unilaterally annexed eastern Georgia and abolished the Bagrationi monarchy, beginning the absorption of the Georgian lands that was completed over the following decades.

   ↗See the data

   [1] [12]

Figures of the era

As Russian rule modernised the Caucasus, Tbilisi became a centre of revolutionary politics, and among the seminarians who turned to Marxism was Ioseb Jughashvili of Gori, the future Joseph Stalin. When the Russian Empire collapsed in 1917, Georgia seized the chance for self-rule. On 26 May 1918 the Democratic Republic of Georgia was proclaimed, governed by Menshevik social democrats who pursued land reform, a democratic constitution and one of the first instances of women's suffrage in the region. The young republic, recognised by several powers, lasted not quite three years.

In February 1921 the Red Army of Soviet Russia invaded. After heavy fighting around Tbilisi the Bolsheviks took the capital and proclaimed the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic on 25 February 1921; the rest of the country was overrun within weeks, and the republic's government went into exile. Georgia was incorporated into the Soviet Union, at first within a Transcaucasian federation and from 1936 as a full union republic. The Soviet decades brought industrialisation and literacy alongside repression: collectivisation, the purges of the 1930s in which Stalin and his secret-police chief Lavrentiy Beria, both Georgians, played central roles, and the long suppression of national and religious life.

Stalin, born in Gori in 1878, rose to lead the Soviet Union, an ambivalent legacy for his homeland. By the late 1980s, as Soviet authority weakened under Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms, a powerful Georgian national movement emerged. On 9 April 1989 Soviet troops violently dispersed a peaceful demonstration in Tbilisi, killing some twenty people; the 'April 9 tragedy' became a rallying point. After a referendum on 31 March 1991 in which Georgians voted overwhelmingly for independence, the Supreme Council restored Georgia's independence on 9 April 1991, exactly two years after the massacre, and elected Zviad Gamsakhurdia as the first president.

Turning points

1. 26 May 1918Independence

   Democratic Republic of Georgia proclaimed

   Amid the collapse of the Russian Empire, Georgia proclaimed an independent democratic republic governed by Mensheviks, with a democratic constitution and land reform.

   ↗See the data

   [13] [1]

2. Feb–Mar 1921War & Rupture

   Red Army conquest

   The Soviet Red Army invaded, took Tbilisi after heavy fighting and proclaimed the Georgian SSR on 25 February 1921, incorporating Georgia into the Soviet Union.

   ↗See the data

   [13] [1]

3. 9 April 1989Politics & Power

   The April 9 tragedy in Tbilisi

   Soviet troops violently broke up a peaceful pro-independence demonstration in Tbilisi, killing about twenty people and galvanising the Georgian national movement.

   [13]

4. 9 April 1991Independence

   Independence restored

   Following a referendum on 31 March, the Supreme Council adopted the Act restoring Georgia's independence on 9 April 1991, two years after the April 9 tragedy.

   ↗See the data

   [13] [17]

Figures of the era

Independence was followed at once by upheaval. President Gamsakhurdia was overthrown in a coup in late 1991 and early 1992, and Eduard Shevardnadze, the former Soviet foreign minister, returned to lead the country. Two separatist conflicts erupted in regions seeking to break from Tbilisi. Fighting in South Ossetia ran from 1991 to 1992, and a war in Abkhazia from 1992 to 1993 ended in the defeat of Georgian forces and the flight of much of the ethnic Georgian population, with both sides accused of grave abuses. Both regions became de facto independent under Russian protection, while remaining internationally recognised as part of Georgia. The casualty and displacement figures cited for these wars are estimates and are disputed.

In November 2003 disputed parliamentary elections triggered mass but peaceful protests in which demonstrators carried roses, the 'Rose Revolution'. Shevardnadze resigned, and the young reformer Mikheil Saakashvili was elected president in January 2004, launching anti-corruption reforms and a decisive orientation toward NATO and the European Union. Tensions with Russia and the separatist regions deepened. In August 2008 a war broke out around South Ossetia between Georgian forces, South Ossetian fighters and the Russian military, which entered Georgian territory; the fighting lasted five days before a French-brokered ceasefire. Afterward Russia recognised the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, a step most of the world rejected. Casualty totals for the war are estimates: an EU-commissioned fact-finding mission put the combined dead at roughly 850, with well over 100,000 people displaced.

Georgia's account of the 2008 conflict and Russia's differ on who fired first and why, and international assessments have apportioned responsibility to both sides; the dossier treats the war and the status of Abkhazia and South Ossetia neutrally. In the years since, Georgia has held its Western course. The United States and most states have continued to recognise Georgia's territorial integrity within its 1991 borders. Georgia signed an Association Agreement with the European Union in 2014, secured visa-free travel to the Schengen area, and applied for EU membership in 2022, being granted candidate status in December 2023. By 2026 the country remained a parliamentary republic balancing its European aspirations against the unresolved disputes on its territory and the weight of its powerful northern neighbour.

Turning points

1. 1992–93War & Rupture

   War in Abkhazia

   Fighting between Georgian forces and Abkhaz separatists, with outside support, ended in Georgian defeat and the displacement of much of the ethnic Georgian population; casualty figures are disputed estimates.

   ↗See the data

   [15] [13]

2. Nov 2003Politics & Power

   The Rose Revolution

   Peaceful mass protests over disputed elections, in which demonstrators carried roses, forced the resignation of President Shevardnadze and brought the reformer Mikheil Saakashvili to power.

   [13]

3. Aug 2008War & Rupture

   Russia–Georgia war over South Ossetia

   A five-day war around South Ossetia drew in the Russian military; estimates put the combined dead at about 850 with over 100,000 displaced. Russia then recognised Abkhazia and South Ossetia, a step most states rejected.

   ↗See the data

   [13] [16]

4. 2014Politics & Power

   EU Association Agreement

   Georgia signed an Association Agreement with the European Union, deepening a Western orientation that later led to its 2022 EU membership application and 2023 candidate status.

   [17] [13]

Figures of the era