David Dadiani

David Dadiani (Georgian: დავით დადიანი; 23 January 1813 – 30 August 1853), of the House of Dadiani, was Prince of Mingrelia, in western Georgia, from 1846 until his death in 1853. A son of Levan V Dadiani, he became de facto ruler of Mingrelia on his father's retirement in 1840. Like his father, David ruled as an autonomous subject of the Russian Empire and served as a major-general of the Russian army. David presided over the frequently heavy-handed efforts to modernize Mingrelia's government, economy, and education. The Russian authorities, citing the Mingrelians' discontent with Dadiani's harsh measures, attempted, but failed to bribe him into resigning his office. David died of malaria at the age of 40.

David Dadiani was born in the village of Chkaduashi near Zugdidi, Mingrelia's capital into the family of the prince-regnant Levan V Dadiani and his wife, Princess Marta, née Tsereteli. As an adolescent, David was sent to Tiflis to be educated under the guidance of the Russian generals Vasili Bebutov and Georg Andreas von Rosen. He was commissioned as a cornet in the Life Guards Cossack regiment in 1829. From 1834 to 1838, he was in his native Mingrelia at his father's request to help reform the principality's crumbling government and economy. However, the young reformer's efforts were not popular with the local nobility and even his father. The disillusioned prince David returned to Tiflis and resumed his service with the Russian military, being promoted to the rank of colonel. Eventually, on 11 May 1840, Levan V resigned the government of Mingrelia in favor of his son; he remained a titular prince-regnant, while David became a co-prince and de facto ruler of the principality. On Levan's death in 1846, David succeeded to all his titles.

Once in government, David embarked on a series of reforms to modernize his principality's administration and economy. He substituted hereditary governors of Mingrelia's districts with appointed officials, removed the court from the high nobility's control and appointed 12 independent lawyers as the final arbiters of justice. He, further, emancipated the lower strata of the clergy from serfdom and, at the same time, placed Mingrelia's chief prelate, the archbishop of Chqondidi, under his authority.

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