Muslim powers are increasingly concerned about the rapid rise of a Christian state in southern Caucasia.

Grand Seljuq Sultan Mahmud II declares a holy war on Georgia in 1121 and rallies a large coalition of Muslim states led by the Artuqid Najm al-din El-ğazi and Toğrul b. Muhammad.

The size of the Muslim army is still a matter of debate with numbers ranging from fantastic six hundred thousand men (Walter the Chancellor’s Bella Antiochena, Matthew of Edessa) to four hundred thousand (Smbat Sparapet’s Chronicle) to modern Georgian estimates of two hundred and fifty thousand to four hundred thousand men.

All sources agree that the Muslim powers gathered an army that was far much larger than the Georgian force of fifty-six thousand men.

However, on August 12, 1121, David and his army rout the Seljuqs on the fields at the base of Mount Didgori.

The victory signals the emergence of Georgia as a significant military power and shifts the regional balance in favor of Georgian cultural and political supremacy.