George was born of Levan of Kakheti's second marriage to a daughter of Kamal Kara-Musel, the shamkhal of Tarku in Dagestan.
According to the 18th-century Georgian historian Prince Vakhushti, Georgewas intended by his father as heir to the throne (Levan had disowned his children by his first marriage to Tinatin Gurieli).
In 1561, Simon I of Kartli, ruler of a neighboring Georgian polity, offered Levan—his father-in-law—an alliance against the Safavid Iranian hegemony.
Levan, anxious to preserve peace at home, was reluctant, but his son George volunteered with the Kakhetian army for Simon's cause.
Arriving at Dzegvi to join the Kartlians, George's troops were attacked and annihilated, on the Easter Day on 6 April 1561, by the Safavid army under Shahverdi Sultan, a Qajar beylerbey of Karabakh, at the battle of Tsikhedidi.