Noe Zhordania

Georgia state institutions Non-Bolshevik socialists 1868–1953 → Died in exile

Leader of the Georgian Mensheviks who headed the government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia in 1918–1921

Born in Guria, western Georgia, in 1868, he took up Marxism at the Warsaw Veterinary Institute and in the 1890s led Mesame Dasi, Georgia’s first legal Marxist organization. He sided with the Mensheviks in 1903 and sat in the First State Duma in 1906. In 1917 he chaired the Tbilisi Soviet and the National Council of Georgia; in May 1918 he headed the session that declared independence, and from July he led the government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia, carrying out land reform and social legislation. After the Red Army invasion of 1921 he went into exile in France, led the government-in-exile and died near Paris in 1953.

Also known as: Noe Jordania · Noy Zhordaniya