Note 211 — Chapter III · THE SPREAD OF ISLAM AMONG THE CHRISTIAN NATIONS OF WESTERN ASIA.

The rest of Georgia had submitted to Persia, and when Tavernier visited this part of the country, about the middle of the seventeenth century, he found it divided into two kingdoms, which were provinces of the Persian empire, and were governed by native Georgian princes who had to turn Muhammadan before being advanced to this dignity.211 One of the first of such princes was the Tsarevitch Constantine, son of King Alexander II of Kakheth, who had been brought up at the Persian court and had there embraced Islam, at the beginning of the seventeenth century.212 The first Muhammadan king of Karthli, the Tsarevitch Rustam (1634–1658), had also been brought up in Persia, and he and his successors to the end of the century were all Muhammadans.213