Guaram, the mampali

Mampali

Mampali was a dynastic title in medieval Georgia , usually held by high-ranking Bagratid princes who did not possess any Byzantine dignities. It is compound of the words mama, "father", and upali, "lord". The following Bagratid princes held the title of mampali:*Guaram Mampali *Gurgen I Mampali...

, (died 882) was a Georgian Bagratid

Bagrationi Dynasty

The Bagrationi dynasty was the ruling family of Georgia. Their ascendency lasted from the early Middle Ages until the early 19th century. In modern usage, this royal line is frequently referred to as the Georgian Bagratids, a Hellenized form of their dynastic name.The origin of the Bagrationi...

 prince and the youngest son of Ashot I, the founder of the Bagratid dynasty of Iberia

Caucasian Iberia

Iberia , also known as Iveria , was a name given by the ancient Greeks and Romans to the ancient Georgian kingdom of Kartli , corresponding roughly to the eastern and southern parts of the present day Georgia...

/Kartli

Kartli

Kartli is a historical region in central-to-eastern Georgia traversed by the river Mtkvari , on which Georgia's capital, Tbilisi, is situated. Known to the Classical authors as Iberia, Kartli played a crucial role in ethnic and political consolidation of the Georgians in the Middle Ages...

.

Guaram shared the control over the patrimonial holdings of Tao-Klarjeti

Tao-Klarjeti

Tao-Klarjeti is the term conventionally used in modern history writing to describe the historic south-western Georgian principalities, now forming part of north-eastern Turkey and divided among the provinces of Erzurum, Artvin, Ardahan and Kars...

 with his two brothers — Bagrat I the Curopalate and Adarnase — his portion being the territory east of the Arsiani Range except for Kola

Göle

Göle ) is a small city and surrounding district in Ardahan Province of Turkey. The city was formerly known as Merdenik, Merdinik or Ardahan-ı Küçük ....

 (now in Turkey

Turkey

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

). According to the Chronicle of Kartli, Guaram was married to a sister of the Armenian

Medieval Armenia

-Prelude:Western Armenia had been under Byzantine control since the partition of the Kingdom of Armenia in AD 387, while Eastern Armenia had been under the occupation of the Sassanid Empire starting 428. Regardless of religious disputes, many Armenians became successful in the Byzantine Empire and...

 ruler Ashot V.

Guaram pursued an aggressive policy of expansion. He seized the Bagratids' traditional foe, the Arab emir of Tbilisi

Emirate of Tbilisi

The Emirs of Tbilisi ruled over the parts of today’s eastern Georgia from their base in the city of Tbilisi, from 736 to 1080 . Established by the Arabs during their invasions of Georgian lands, the emirate was an important outpost of the Muslim rule in the Caucasus until recaptured by the...

, named Gabulots, and sent him in chains to Byzantium

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

. Following the extinction of the ruling house (vitaxae) of Gogarene, which had been in possession of several areas on the Georgian-Armenian frontier, Guaram acquired Javakheti

Javakheti

Javakheti is a historical region of the nation of Georgia, in the southeastern part of the country's Samtskhe-Javakheti province. Today it comprises the Akhalkalaki and Ninotsminda municipal territories. It was historically bordered in the west with both sides of the Mtkvari river, in the north,...

, Trialeti

Trialeti

Trialeti is a mountainous area in central Georgia. In Georgian its name means "a place of wandering". The Trialeti Range is a part of the greater Trialeti Region....

, Ashots

Achots

Achots was a region and a family of the old Armenia c. 400–800.The ruler c. 430 was Hemaiak Achotsi, and c. 445 Hrarat Achotsi....

, and Artani

Ardahan

Ardahan is a city in northeastern Turkey, near the Georgian border.-Ancient and medieval:In Ancient times the region was called Gogarene, which is assumed to derive from the name of Gugars, who were a Proto-Kartvelian tribe...

. The 10th-century hagiographer Giorgi Merchule

Giorgi Merchule

thumb|Icon of Giorgi MerchuleGiorgi Merchule was a 10th-century Georgian monk and writer who authored "The Vita of Grigol Khandzteli", a hagiographic novel dealing with the life of the prominent Georgian churchman St. Grigol Khandzteli .Giorgi was a monk at the Georgian Orthodox monastery of...

 praises Guaram's dignities and refers to him as "the great".

Prior to 876, Guaram handed over some of his possessions to his brothers, and gave Ashots to his Armenian brother-in-law Ashot V. Liparit, of the Liparitids (Baguashi), took over Trialeti

Trialeti

Trialeti is a mountainous area in central Georgia. In Georgian its name means "a place of wandering". The Trialeti Range is a part of the greater Trialeti Region....

, where he built the stronghold Klde-Karni

Kldekari (duchy)

Kldekari was a duchy in the mediaeval Georgia. Ruled by a powerful dynasty of Baghvashi, the duchy existed from 876 to 1103 in the southern Kvemo Kartli province, and, despite its small size, created particular problems to the Bagrationi kings who sought to bring all Georgian lands into a single...

 and placed himself under suzerainty of Guaram's nephew David I the Curopalate

David I Kuropalates

David I was a Georgian Bagratid Prince and curopalates of Iberia/Kartli from 876 to 881.The eldest son and successor of Bagrat I, he was baptised by the influential Georgian monk Grigol Khandzteli. David shared the Bagratid hereditary lands in Tao-Klarjeti with his uncles and cousins, his fiefdom...

 soon after 876. These rearrangements left Guaram's son Nasra

Nasra

Nasra or Nasr was a Georgian prince of the Bagratid dynasty of Tao-Klarjeti involved and eventually killed in a dynastic war with his relatives....

 essentially with no inheritance and probably induced him in 881 to murder his cousin David I in a plot of which Guaram is reported by a medieval chronicler to have been ignorant. Guaram's younger son, Ashot, died in his father's lifetime, in 869. Guaram also had a daughter whose name is not recorded. She was married to two successive Abasgian rulers Adarnase

Adarnase of Abkhazia

Adarnase Shavliani was the King of Abkhazia between 880 and 887/888. He succeeded his father, the usurper John Shavliani, to the throne but was deposed and put to death by Bagrat I, the son of Demetrius II.- See also :*Abkhazian Kingdom...

 and Bagrat I

Bagrat I of Abkhazia

Bagrat I was the King of Abkhazia between 887/88 and 898/99. He was the son of Demetrius II of the Anosids dynasty. After the usurper John Shavliani seized the throne Bagrat fled to Constantinople and lived there for some time until he returned to Abkhazia in 887/888, deposed and put to death...

.

Guaram spent his last years in retirement at the Opiza convent where he was buried after his death in 882.