David III the Great of Tao

David III, called the Great, kouropalates of Tao, was the most powerful Georgian ruler of the tenth century and, more than any other individual, the architect of Georgia's unification under his adopted heir Bagrat III. He belonged to the second house of Tao, a cadet branch of the Bagrationi, as the younger son of Adarnase V of Tao, and succeeded his brother Bagrat II of Tao in Upper Tao in 966. Georgian writers called him the greatest of the kings of Tao.

His moment came in the Byzantine civil war of 976 to 979. When the rebel Bardas Skleros threatened the emperor Basil II, David sent twelve thousand horsemen under his commander Tornikios, who helped win the loyalist victory at Pankalia on 24 March 979. Basil rewarded him with the title of kouropalates and, for his lifetime, imperial territory in eastern Anatolia including Theodosiopolis. Tornikios, who became a monk, used the spoils to found the Georgian monastery of Iviron on Mount Athos. David spent the revenues of the trade routes he now controlled on fortresses, towns, and churches such as Oshki and Parkhali.

Childless, David adopted around 976 his young kinsman Bagrat, son of Gurgen of Iberia and of Gurandukht, sister of the Abkhazian kings, and secured for him Kartli in 976 and the Abkhazian crown in 978, uniting in one heir the Bagrationi of Kartli and the royal house of Abkhazia. In 987 he sided with his old ally Bardas Phokas against Basil II, apparently hoping to make his imperial lands hereditary; after Phokas's defeat in 989 he submitted, kept his title, and agreed that his territories would pass to the empire at his death. He then turned against the Muslim emirs, retaking Manzikert about 993 and defeating the Rawadid emir Mamlan near Archesh in 998.

David was murdered by his own nobles, poisoned, according to the Armenian chronicler Aristakes Lastivertsi, in the communion cup on Holy Thursday. Armenian sources place this at Easter 1000; the Georgian chronicles give 1001. Basil II marched east and took his lands, and Bagrat III, unable to resist, accepted the title of kouropalates instead. Whether the emperor was owed only the lifetime grants or all of Tao remained disputed for a generation.