Prince Alexander of Imereti (1674–1711)

Prince Alexander of Imereti (ალექსანდრე, Aleksandre), also known as Tsarevich Aleksandr Archilovich Imeretinsky (Александр Арчилович Имеретинский) (1674 – February 20, 1711) was a Georgian prince (batonishvili) of the Kingdom of Imereti who lived as an émigré in the Tsardom of Russia and subsequently served as an artillery commander under Tsar Peter I of Russia. During the Great Northern War, he was taken prisoner at Narva (1700) and spent ten years in Swedish captivity. He died on his way back to Russia.

Biography
He was born in Tbilisi to Archil, a Georgian Bagratid prince and sometime king of Imereti, who fled the anarchy in his country to Russia. His mother was Ketevan, a member of the Kakhetian Bagratid family. Since 1684, Alexander and his brother, Mamuka (Matvey) (died in 1693), were raised in Moscow under the auspices of Knyaz Fedul Volkonsky and Dyak Ivan Kazarinov. Alexander befriended with the young Russian tsarevich Pyotr Alekseyevich, subsequently Peter I of Russia, whom he joined in his war games. In 1690, Alexander was present at his father’s futile attempt to regain the throne of Imereti. In 1697, he accompanied Peter in the Grand Embassy to Europe. He studied artillery at The Hague and, upon his return to Russia, became the first Russian officer to be promoted to the rank of General Feldzeugmeister and appointed the chief of the Pushkarsky Prikaz (literally, "cannon administration"). With the outbreak of the Great Northern War, in which Russia confronted Sweden, Alexander was put in command of the Russian artillery (145 cannons and 28 howitzers). He was present at the 1700 Battle of Narva, which ended in disaster, with the whole Russian artillery and its commander being captured by the victorious Swedes. He was taken to Stockholm, where spent ten years as a prisoner of war until being ransomed by Peter I in 1710. Severely ill, he died at Riga, during his return journey to Russia. He was buried at Donskoy Monastery, Moscow. Prince Alexander is a purported translator of The Testament of Basil the Macedonian into Georgian.

Family
Prince Alexander was married twice. He wed c. 1688 Teodora (died 1689), daughter of the Russian boyarin Ivan Mikhailovich Miloslavsky. Her dowry, the village of Vsekhsvyatskoye near Moscow eventually became a possession of the Georgian royal repatriates in Russia. Alexander married his second wife, Glikeria (1672 – 28 July 1720), daughter of Prince Elizbar (Ilia) Bagration-Davitishvili around 1690. The marriage produced Alexander's only child, Sophia (18 September 1691 – 4 January 1747, who married Georgian exile in Russia, Major-General Prince Igor Dadiani (1691–1765).