With members of the Mirimanidze clan having returned to Christianity (Georgian Orthodox) from Shia Islam, they were included in the Treaty of Georgievsk (1783) as the Melikishvili.
This inclusion in the Georgievsk Treaty guaranteed for their noble status later in the Russian Empire as the Melikovs along with a branch, the Loris-Melikovs (Armenian Apostolic).
At the time, Somkhiti was located in the most southern part of Georgian Lower Kartli, and was therefore subjected to Safavid influence and rule from its earliest days.
[1] Somkhiti originally meant "the place where the Armenians live",[2] and in the 18th century, the termination was largely replaced with "Somkheti" (სომხეთი, [somχetʰi]) as a Georgian exonym for Armenia.
[4] Though ethnically Armenian, numerous Safavid historians at the time (e.g. Parsadan Gorgijanidze, Fazli Khuzani, Molla Jalal, Arakel of Tabriz, Iskandar Beg Munshi) described the family's origins, and they did so quite differently and not unanimously as compared to each other.