Prince David of Kakheti

David of Kakheti
David in sketch by the contemporary Italian missionary Cristoforo Castelli.
Ruler of Mukhrani
Reign	1626–1648
Predecessor	Kaikhosro
Successor	Vakhtang II
Born	c. 1612
Died	1648 Magharo
Burial	Alaverdi Monastery
Spouse	Elene Diasamidze
Issue among others...	Heraclius I of Kakheti Ketevan of Kakheti
Dynasty	Bagrationi dynasty
Father	Teimuraz I of Kakheti
Mother	Khorashan of Kartli
Religion	Georgian Orthodox Church

David (Georgian: დავითი) also known by the hypocorism Datuna (Georgian: დათუნა) (c. 1612 – 1648) was a prince (batonishvili) of the royal house of Kakheti, a kingdom in eastern Georgia. He was the only son of King Teimuraz I of Kakheti to have survived into adulthood. He fathered the future King Heraclius I of Kakheti, who continued the royal line of the Kakhetian Bagrationi. From 1627 until his death in battle with the pro-Persian Georgian ruler Rostom of Kartli, he held sway over the fief of Mukhrani, whose princely rulers had been dispossessed by Teimuraz I.

David was born around 1612 into the family of Teimuraz I, the king of the eastern Georgian kingdom of Kakheti, and his second wife Khorashan, a sister of the neighboring Georgian monarch, Luarsab II of Kartli. He was the youngest of Teimuraz's sons and the king's only male offspring to have survived into adulthood. David's two elder half-brothers died in captivity in Persia, castrated at the order of the Persian shah Abbas I, who fought a devastating war against Kakheti in order to bend Teimuraz I into submission. David emerged in the political life of eastern Georgia in 1627, when he was bestowed with the princedom of Mukhrani, the fief of Kaikhosro, Prince of Mukhrani, a disgraced nobleman of Kartli, who had been forced to seek refuge in the Ottoman Empire alongside with Teimuraz's domestic arch-rival, Giorgi Saakadze.