Georgia proclaimed itself as independent state

After the Russian Revolution of 1917, Georgia declared independence on 26 May 1918, in the midst of the Russian Civil War. The Menshevik Georgian Social-Democratic Party won the parliamentary election. Its leader, Noe Zhordania, became prime minister.

The 1918 Georgian–Armenian War, which erupted over parts of Georgian provinces populated mostly by Armenians, ended because of British intervention. In 1918–1919, Georgian general Giorgi Mazniashvili led an attack against the White Army led by Moiseev and Denikin in order to claim the Black Sea coastline from Tuapse to Sochi and Adler for independent Georgia.

The country's independence did not last long. Georgia was under British protection from 1918–1920.

In February 1921, Georgia was attacked by the Red Army. The Georgian army was defeated and the Social-Democratic government fled the country. On 25 February 1921, the Red Army entered Tbilisi and installed a communist government loyal to Moscow, led by Georgian Bolshevik Filipp Makharadze

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The territory of modern-day Georgia was inhabited by Homo erectus since the Paleolithic Era. The proto-Georgian tribes first appear in written history in the 12th century BC

The classical period saw the rise of the early Georgian states

• Diauehi (13th century BC),
• Colchis (8th century BC),
• Sper (7th century BC) and
• Iberia (6th century BC).

In the 4th century BC, a unified kingdom of Georgia – an early example of advanced state organization under one king and an aristocratic hierarchy – was established.

Sargon II (722–705 BC) of the Assyrian empire conquered the Georgian state of Tabal and all of the Hittite kingdoms of the Taurus Mountains.

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The Kingdom of Georgia reached its zenith in the 12th to early 13th centuries. This period during the reigns of David IV (called David the Builder, r. 1089–1125) and his granddaughter Tamar (r. 1184–1213) has been widely termed as Georgia's Golden Age or the Georgian Renaissance.

This early Georgian renaissance, which preceded its Western European analogue, was characterized by impressive military victories, territorial expansion, and a cultural renaissance in architecture, literature, philosophy and the sciences. The Golden age of Georgia left a legacy of great cathedrals, romantic poetry and literature, and the epic poem "The Knight in the Panther's Skin"

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In 1783, Russia and the eastern Georgian Kingdom of Kartli-Kakheti signed the Treaty of Georgievsk, which recognized the bond of Eastern Orthodoxy between the Russian and Georgian people and promised eastern Georgia protection against further Persian attacks, or by other aggressors.

However, despite this commitment to defend Georgia, Russia rendered no assistance when the Persians invaded in 1795, completely devastating Tbilisi and massacring its inhabitants, as the new heir to the throne sought to reassert Persian hegemony of Georgia.