He immediately launched a series of stringent measures against the renegade nobles and slave trade from which they profited in conjunction with the Ottoman authorities.

In 1752, the aristocratic opposition staged a coup, but Solomon quickly regained the crown and began a program of reforms aimed at stabilizing the kingdom torn apart by chronic civil wars[citation needed].

The Ottomans, which saw Imereti as the sphere of their influence, sent in an army, but Solomon succeeded in mobilizing his nobles around him and defeated the invaders at the Battle of Khresili in 1757.

The two kings decided to request five Russian regiments and join the war with the Ottoman Empire in exchange of the guarantee that Georgian interests would be protected in the final Russo-Turkish peace deal.

After the war was over, Solomon was able to force his autonomist vassals, princes of Mingrelia and Guria, into submission, and continued antagonizing the Ottoman hegemony in the region.