Mamia II Gurieli

Mamia II Gurieli (Georgian: მამია II გურიელი; died 1625), of the House of Gurieli, was Prince of Guria from 1600 until his death at the hands of his own son Simon in 1625. Mamia's rule over his small principality, located in southwest Georgia, saw efforts to rebuff encroachments of the Ottoman Empire, with which he was forced to make peace in 1614, conceding the loss of territories and placing Guria under the obligation of paying tribute.

Accession and war with the Ottomans

Mamia was the eldest son of Giorgi II Gurieli, whom he accompanied in a campaign in the Kingdom of Imereti in 1589. He was left to protect Giorgi's appointee as king of Imereti, Bagrat IV, but he could not prevent Bagrat's fall in the following year. Mamia succeeded as prince-regnant of Guria on his father's death in 1600.[1][2][3]

In 1609, Mamia Gurieli took advantage of the then-ongoing Ottoman–Safavid War and recovered Adjara from the Turks. The latter responded with a naval blockade of the Black Sea coastline, denying Guria and its newfound ally, Manuchar II Dadiani of Mingrelia, the import of salt, iron, and other commodities. The protracted tensions were witnessed by the Jesuit missionary Luigi Grangerio, who accompanied the Ottoman plenipotentiary Omar Pasha to Georgia in 1614. Gurieli was eventually forced to agree on peace terms. On 13 December 1614 he met with an Ottoman envoy in Batumi and agreed to evacuate Adjara and pay an annual tribute to the Ottoman Empire. Early in 1615, Dadiani of Mingrelia followed Gurieli's suit. Both rulers retained the right to deny armed Turks entry.[2][3]

Later rule and death

Western Georgian rulers—Gurieli, Dadiani, and the king of Imereti—forgot their differences for a time and were united against the Ottoman and Safavid threat and in solidarity to Teimuraz I of Kakheti, an eastern Georgian monarch, expelled by the Safavids. The unity did not last long. In 1620, the Imeretian crown-prince Alexander disavowed his wife Tamar, Mamia Gurieli's daughter and, as the Theatin missionary Giuseppe Maria Zampi relates, a woman "of rare beauty", who was accused of adultery and sent back, with her baby son Bagrat, to Guria. Levan II Dadiani, the ambitious ruler of Mingrelia, and the Abkhaz nobles supported the offended Gurieli.[1]

As western Georgia was descending into a renewed anarchy and internecine war, Mamia was murdered by his son Simon I while he slept. According to the 18th-century historian Prince Vakhushti this occurred in 1625, the dating supported also by one contemporary document and generally accepted in modern scholarship.[2][4] On the other hand, a note attached to the 17th-century liturgical anthology (gulani) from the Shemokmedi Monastery dates Mamia's death to 1627.[2]

Family

Mamia II Gurieli was married to Tinatin (died 1628), daughter of the atabag of Samtskhe—Qvarqvare II Jaqeli or Manuchar II Jaqeli.[4] Mamia's children were:

References
  1. Bagrationi, Vakhushti (1976). Nakashidze, N.T. (ed.). История Царства Грузинского [History of the Kingdom of Georgia] (PDF) (in Russian). Tbilisi: Metsniereba. pp. 138–139.
  2. Khakhutaishvili, Davit (2009). "ნარკვევები გურიის სამთავროს ისტორიიდან (XV-XVIII სს.)" [Studies in the history of the Principality of Guria (15th–18th centuries)]. სამტომეული, ტ. 2 [Works in three volumes, Vol. 2] (in Georgian). Batumi: Shota Rustaveli State University. pp. 43–45. ISBN 978-9941-409-60-8.
  3. Rayfield, Donald (2012). Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia. London: Reaktion Books. pp. 194–195. ISBN 1780230303.
  4. Grebelsky, P. Kh.; Dumin, S.V.; Lapin, V.V. (1993). Дворянские роды Российской империи. Том 4: Князья Царства Грузинского [Noble families of the Russian Empire. Vol. 4: Princes of the Kingdom of Georgia] (in Russian). Vesti. p. 37.
Mamia II Gurieli
Regnal titles
Preceded by
Giorgi II Gurieli		 Prince of Guria
1600–1625		 Succeeded by
Simon I Gurieli
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