Prince Dimitri Kipiani (April 14, 1814 – October 24, 1887) was a Georgian

Georgia (country)

Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...

 publicist, writer, translator and a leader of liberal nobility.

He was born to a noble family in the village of Mereti near Gori, Georgia

Gori, Georgia

Gori is a city in eastern Georgia, which serves as the regional capital of Shida Kartli and the centre of the homonymous administrative district. The name is from Georgian gora , that is, "heap", or "hill"...

, then part of Imperial Russia. Having graduated from the Tiflis School of Nobility in 1830, he then worked there as a teacher. Following the collapse of the 1832 Georgian plot against the Russian rule, to which Kipiani was a participant, he was deported to Vologda

Vologda

Vologda is a city and the administrative, cultural, and scientific center of Vologda Oblast, Russia, located on the Vologda River. The city is a major transport knot of the Northwest of Russia. Vologda is among the Russian cities possessing an especially valuable historical heritage...

, where he briefly worked for the local governor's chancellery. Allowed to return to Georgia in 1837, he entered the civil service and held, until 1864, various positions at the viceregal

Viceroy

A viceroy is a royal official who runs a country, colony, or province in the name of and as representative of the monarch. The term derives from the Latin prefix vice-, meaning "in the place of" and the French word roi, meaning king. A viceroy's province or larger territory is called a viceroyalty...

 office. During his tenure, he became a prominent spokesman for liberal nobility. During the emancipation reform

Emancipation reform of 1861

The Emancipation Reform of 1861 in Russia was the first and most important of liberal reforms effected during the reign of Alexander II of Russia. The reform, together with a related reform in 1861, amounted to the liquidation of serf dependence previously suffered by peasants of the Russian Empire...

, he was entrusted with the task of formulating the noble position and charged, in 1862, with devising a way to free the Georgian serfs. His plan did not well compensate the serfs; they would not be given any land, but rather would continue to farm their landlord's plots and pay for the use of it. Subsequently, he was actively involved in the emancipation program, articulating the interests of the small and middle nobility. He was elected as a Marshal of the Nobility of the Tiflis

Tiflis Governorate

Tiflis Governorate was one of the guberniyas of the Russian Empire with its centre in Tiflis . In 1897 it constituted 44,607 sq. kilometres in area and had a population of 1,051,032 inhabitants...

 and Kutaisi

Kutaisi

Kutaisi is Georgia's second largest city and the capital of the western region of Imereti. It is 221 km to the west of Tbilisi.-Geography:...

 guberniya

Guberniya

A guberniya was a major administrative subdivision of the Russian Empire usually translated as government, governorate, or province. Such administrative division was preserved for sometime upon the collapse of the empire in 1917. A guberniya was ruled by a governor , a word borrowed from Latin ,...

s from 1864 to 1870 and from 1879 to 1886, respectively. In the period of 1876-1879, he served as a mayor

Mayor

In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....

 of Tiflis.

At the same time, Kipiani was energetically involved in Georgia’s social and cultural life. He was a Vice-President of the Caucasian

Caucasus

The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...

 Agrarian Society and a co-founder of the Tiflis Nobility Bank, Society for the Spreading of Literacy Among Georgians

Society for the Spreading of Literacy Among Georgians

The Society for the Spreading of Literacy Among Georgians was a charity founded by a group of leading Georgian intellectuals in May 1879 in order to promote a cultural renaissance among the peasantry of Georgia, then part of the Russian Empire...

 and "Georgian Dramatic Society". His essays and articles were systematically published in Georgian and Russian press. He became the first Georgian translator of Shakespeare and authored a book, Modern Georgian Grammar. In addition to its strictly practical and educational value, the book was of considerable political significance, for the disagreement between Georgian intellectuals and Imperial authorities over the language issue was growing increasingly tense. Despite Kipiani's professed loyalty, the Russian authorities were suspicious of him. Kipiani saw the 1783 Treaty of Georgievsk

Treaty of Georgievsk

The Treaty of Georgievsk was a bilateral treaty concluded between the Russian Empire and the east Georgian kingdom of Kartli-Kakheti on July 24, 1783. The treaty established Georgia as a protectorate of Russia, which guaranteed Georgia's territorial integrity and the continuation of its reigning...

 the only fair model for the Russian-Georgian relations and remained a stubborn defender of a native language and culture. Convinced that "real progress can only be achieved by a nation that thinks and speaks in its native language", he opposed a policy of limiting the status of Georgian language in state-sponsored schools in the 1870s. In October 1885, Kipiani denounced the Russian viceroy of the Caucasus, Aleksandr Dondukov-Korsakov, to Grand Duke Michael Nicolaievich of Russia

Grand Duke Michael Nicolaievich of Russia

Grand Duke Michael Nikolaevich of Russia was the fourth son and seventh child of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia and Charlotte of Prussia...

 whom he met during Michael’s visit to Borjomi

Borjomi

Borjomi is a resort town in south-central Georgia with a population estimated at 14,445. It is one of the districts of the Samtskhe-Javakheti region and is situated in the northwestern part of the region in the picturesque Borjomi Gorge on the eastern edge of the Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park...

, and accused the viceroy of persecuting Georgian culture. He composed a special report to the viceroy and the Imperial administration, but was forced to moderate his activities under a strong pressure from St. Petersburg.

Nevertheless, Kipiani's final split with the Russian authorities followed shortly afterwards. It occurred in connection with the notorious incident in 1886, when a Georgian student Laghiashvili, expelled from the Tbilisi Theological Seminary for his nationalist sentiments, assassinated the rector, Chudetsky, who had banned Georgian as medium of instruction in the seminary and described it as "a language for dogs." When the Russian Exarch

Exarch

In the Byzantine Empire, an exarch was governor with extended authority of a province at some remove from the capital Constantinople. The prevailing situation frequently involved him in military operations....

 of Georgia, Pavel, anathematized the Georgian nation in response to the incident, Kipiani wrote to him on June 8, 1886: "Your Reverence, rumor has it that you have anathematized the country which you have been called on to guide spiritually and which looked to you only for love and grace. If all this is true, Your Reverence, the only way of rescuing the honor of your office is for the insulter to leave the insulted country forthwith." On August 6, on the order of tsar

Tsar

Tsar is a title used to designate certain European Slavic monarchs or supreme rulers. As a system of government in the Tsardom of Russia and Russian Empire, it is known as Tsarist autocracy, or Tsarism...

 Alexander III of Russia

Alexander III of Russia

Alexander Alexandrovich Romanov , historically remembered as Alexander III or Alexander the Peacemaker reigned as Emperor of Russia from until his death on .-Disposition:...

, Kipiani was removed from his post and sent into exile to Stavropol

Stavropol

-International relations:-Twin towns/sister cities:Stavropol is twinned with: Des Moines, United States Béziers, France Pazardzhik, Bulgaria-External links:* **...

 where he was soon murdered in mysterious circumstances.

On October 26, 1887, he was reburied to Tiflis and interred at the Mtatsminda Pantheon

Mtatsminda Pantheon

The Mtatsminda Pantheon of Writers and Public Figures is a necropolis in Tbilisi, Georgia, where some of the most prominent writers, artists, scholars, and national heroes of Georgia are buried. It is located in the churchyard around St. David’s Church "Mamadaviti" on the slope of Mount Mtatsminda...

.

Main works

• "Несколько мыслей о материалах для истории Грузии" ("Кавказ", 1854, № 30 - 33, 35 и 39).
• "Записки" ("Русская Старина", 1886, книги 3, 5, 7 - 9).