Bagrat IV.

Bagrat IV.

Bagrat IV (* 1018 ; † November 24, 1072 ) was King of Georgia from 1027 to 1072 ; he is a son of Giorgis I.

Life

The nine-year-old Bagrat was initially under the reign of his mother Mariam Artsruni, an Armenian king's daughter, who initiated a policy of reconciliation with Byzantium . In 1029 the Georgian Catholicos Patriarch Melchizedech I first visited Constantinople and then the Georgian regent. A wedding between Bagrat and the imperial niece Elena was arranged.

In 1032 the bride was brought to Kutaisi , but her untimely death ended the brief rapprochement between Georgia and Byzantium. It suffered another deep rift when Bagrat's half-brother Demetre Giorgishvili, who laid claims to the Georgian throne, surrendered the fortress of Anakopia to the Byzantines and fled to Constantinople. Bagrat now ignored further Byzantine marriage projects by taking the Ossetian princess Borena as his wife.

After 1034 Bagrat took up an expansionist policy with his barons . First the emirate of Gəncə was defeated and in 1035 the Georgians succeeded in capturing Jafar, the emir of Tbilisi . Four years later, Tbilisi was besieged and after another three years the city was ripe for surrender. Liparit Orbeliani, one of the most powerful feudal lords of Bagrat, had decisive success. Fearing that it might become too powerful, the king and Jafar made peace. With this, Bagrat IV made Liparit his mortal enemy. The feud between the two lasted for over twenty years and weakened the kingdom before the Seljuk invasion.

To make matters worse, the Byzantines made territorial claims on both Georgian and Armenian territories. In 1045 they fell into the hands of the Armenian capital Ani , one of the largest medieval cities with over 100,000 inhabitants. The rule of the Byzantines in Ani ended after three years with the occupation by the Seljuks. In 1048 Bagrat succeeded in conquering Tbilisi.

In order to forge an alliance with the Byzantines against the Seljuks , the king stayed in Constantinople in 1054/57. Liparit Orbeliani took advantage of this and crowned Bagrat's underage son, Giorgi (II) , with the consent of the Queen Mother as ruler of Georgia. Bagrat managed to occupy Ani again, but in 1064 the city again fell to the Seljuks. In 1071 the Byzantine emperor Romanos IV was defeated by them in the battle of Manzikert . The way to Georgia was now open.

predecessor	Office	successor
Giorgi I.	King of Georgia 1027-1072	Giorgi II

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