Demetrius of Guria

Demetrius Gurieli (, died ), of the House of Gurieli, was Prince of Guria from 1658 to 1664 and King of Imereti from 1663 to 1664. His rule in Guria as well as in Imereti were result of coups and part of a chaotic civil war raging in these western Georgian polities. Demetre's royal career in Imereti terminated with his deposition and blinding.

Biography Demetrius was a member of the Gurieli, a family of princes-regnant of Guria. His parentage is not directly attested in the surviving chronicles and documents; Demetrius appears to have been a son of Simon I Gurieli, In 1660, Kaikhosro, with Ottoman support, returned and put Demetrius to flight to Imereti. Demetrius was able to resume his rule in Guria after having Prince Machutadze murdered Kaikhosro.

In the conflict with Kaikhosro, Demetrius relied on Vameq III Dadiani, an ambitious prince of Mingrelia and briefly king of Imereti, whom he eventually betrayed and joined King Vakhtang V, King of Kartli, who intervened in the chaotic civil war in Imereti in 1661. Amid a series of coups and counter-coups, one part of the Imeretian nobles made Demetre king after the abdication of Vakhtang V's son Archil in 1663. His rule proved short-lived: the Imeretians caught, blinded, and expelled him and restored Bagrat V. According to the 18th-century Georgian historian Prince Vakhushti, Demetrius' final downfall occurred in 1668. Thereafter he disappeared from history. As prince of Guria, he was succeeded by George III Gurieli, an exiled son of his erstwhile foe, Kaikhosro Gurieli. Vakhushti's dating is sometimes questioned in modern historiography, notably by Davit Khakhutaishvili, who argued that Demetrius' rule in Guria should have ended no later than 1664.