More recent version, now widely accepted among the historians of Georgia, has it that Heraclius did not actually marry Princess Orbeliani, but disowned the engagement and took Ketevan, daughter of Prince Zaal Pkheidze, as his first legitimate wife in 1740.
In 1738 Ketevan was betrothed to Heraclius, a prince of the royal house of Kakheti, who was then accompanying his suzerain, Nader Shah of Iran, in the Afghan campaign.
The betrothal was arranged through the efforts of Heraclius's mother, Tamar, with the help of Ketevan's paternal aunt, Bangua, who was married to the influential Georgian nobleman, Givi Amilakhvari.
Ketevan had, thus, been considered to have been the first wife of Heraclius until their divorce in 1744 and the mother of two of his children, Princess Rusudan (died in infancy) and Prince Vakhtang.
This version, based on the account of Heraclius's grandson, Alexander Orbeliani, has it that the engagement between Heraclius and Ketevan had been repudiated before the marriage was consummated and the first wife of Heraclius—and the mother of his two older children—was another woman, also named Ketevan (died 1744), daughter of Zaal Pkheidze, of the Imeretian princely family of Pkheidze (Mkheidze).