The House of Tavdgiridze ( ka, თავდგირიძე) is an old
Georgian noble family, known since the 14th century. In 19th century it became also part of
Russian nobility
The Russian nobility or ''dvoryanstvo'' () arose in the Middle Ages. In 1914, it consisted of approximately 1,900,000 members, out of a total population of 138,200,000. Up until the February Revolution of 1917, the Russian noble estates staffed ...
.
History
They hailed from the southern provinces of Georgia which fell under the
Ottoman rule in the 16th century. This forced many of the Tavdgiridze to relocate to relatively safer areas such as
Kartli
Kartli ( ka, ქართლი ) is a historical region in central-to-eastern Georgia traversed by the river Mtkvari (Kura), on which Georgia's capital, Tbilisi, is situated. Known to the Classical authors as Iberia, Kartli played a crucial rol ...
, Imereti, and Guria. In the latter province, in the 17th century, the family was bestowed by the local ruling prince Giorgi III Gurieli with an estate in Lower Guria and the hereditary office of Chief Bailiff (bok’auli). The Ottoman expansion into Lower Guria in the 1770s divided the Tavdgiridze family along religious lines. Mamuka Tavdgiridze and his household fled the Ottomans in the north of Guria. His Christianity, Christian descendants received among the knyaz, princely nobility of the Russian Empire in 1850.
[Cyril Toumanoff, Toumanoff, Cyril (1967). ''Studies in Christian Caucasian History'', p. 270. Georgetown University Press.] One of Mamuka's sons, Maxime, became Muslim, adopted the name of Süleyman and was conferred by the Ottoman government with the sanjak of Çürüksu (Kobuleti). His descendants remained loyal local rulers to the Ottoman Empire, fighting the Russians in the wars of Crimean War, 1853-6 and Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878), 1877-8. One of these, Hasan-Bey was killed in 1854, while Ali-Paşa and Osman-Paşa (“of Adjara”) had to resettle to Turkey as Muhajir (Caucasus), muhajirs in 1878. Hasan and Ali are satirized in local folk songs of Guria.
[ Giorgi Melikishvili, Melikishvili, Giorgi (ed., 1974), საქართველოს ისტორიის ნარკვევები (''Studies in the History of Georgia'')]
Vol. 4.
Tbilisi: Sabch’ota Sakartvelo.
References
{{reflist
Noble families of Georgia (country)
Georgian-language surnames