Tsereteli was born in the village of Skhvitori, Imereti region of western Georgia on June 9, 1840, to a prominent Georgian aristocratic family.

His father was Prince Rostom Tsereteli, his mother, Princess Ekaterine, a daughter of Ivane Abashidze and a great-granddaughter of King Solomon I of Imereti.

Tsereteli was a close friend of Ilia Chavchavadze, a Georgian progressive intellectual youth leader.

He is an author of hundreds of patriotic, historical, lyrical and satiric poems, also humoristic stories and autobiographic novel.

[2] He attacked Armenians for their perceived mercantilism and portrayed them as a flea sucking Georgian blood in one fable.