Anton II the Great Martyr (Georgian: ანტონ II), born Prince Royal Teimuraz (თეიმურაზ ბატონიშვილი), (8 January 1762 or 1763 – 21 December 1827) was a member of the Georgian royal family and churchman. A son of Heraclius II, the penultimate King of Kartli and Kakheti, he was the Catholicos Patriarch of Georgia from 1788 to 1811.
After the Russian Empire annexed Georgia in 1801, Anton resisted the encroachments from the Imperial officials in the Georgian church affairs. Eventually, Anton was forced to leave Georgia for St. Petersburg in 1810 and stripped of his office in 1811. He was, thus, the last Georgian catholicos patriarch in the 19th century; the title was abolished by the Russian Empire and the autocephalous Georgian Orthodox Church was reduced to an exarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church. Anton spent his last years in retirement in Nizhny Novgorod, where he died in 1827. He was canonized by the Georgian church in 2011.
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Early life
Anton II was born as Prince Royal (batonishvili) Teimuraz, so named after his paternal grandfather King Teimuraz II. He was born of Heraclius II's third marriage to Darejan Dadiani. The young prince was educated at the royal court at Tbilisi and then at the Tbilisi Theological Seminary under the guidance of Anton I, his relative and predecessor as Catholicos Patriarch of Georgia. In 1782, he made his monastic profession and took the name Anton.