Sahac

Sahac, or Sahak, belongs to the legendary prologue of Bagratid history rather than to its documented record. The eleventh-century chronicler Sumbat Davitis-dze, in his Life and Tale of the Bagratids, traces the dynasty to seven brothers of the line of King David who left Palestine, were baptized in Armenia, and divided: three remained in Armenia, where their descendants ruled as the Bagratuni, and four came to Kartli. Of the four, Guaram was chosen eristavi and founded the Georgian line; Sahak went to Kakheti; and Asam and Varazvard seized Kambechani.

Of Sahak the chronicle says only that in Kakheti he allied himself by marriage with Bakur, son of Nerse, evidently a member of the old royal house of Kartli. The chronicle speaks of a marriage alliance without naming the bride, recorded in this genealogy as Bakur's daughter. Sumbat gives no date, though his narrative places the brothers' arrival in the sixth century, and no other source mentions Sahak.

Modern historians, following Cyril Toumanoff, regard the story of the seven brothers as a legend composed to furnish the Bagrationi with a biblical pedigree: the Guaram of the tale is the historical Guaramid prince of Kartli, and the Georgian Bagratids in fact descend from an Armenian Bagratuni prince, Adarnase, who settled in Kartli in the late eighth century. Sahak's place here is therefore the one assigned by the dynasty's own historian, not one established by independent evidence.