Mkhargrdzeli-Arghutashvili (Georgian: მხარგრძელი-არღუთაშვილი), later known as Argutinsky-Dolgorukov (Russian: Аргутинский-Долгоруков) was an Armeno-Georgian noble family whose double surname indicates their descent from Arghut (died 1506) and the family’s purported origin from the medieval house of Mkhargrdzeli (Zachariads). "Dolgorukov" is a direct Russian translation of "Mkhargdzeli", literally meaning in Georgian "a long-arm".
The founder of the family, Arghut, established himself in Lori, northern Armenia, then under Georgian control, at the end of the 15th century. His descendants were received among the lower-class nobility (aznauri) of Georgia, and enfeoffed of Sanahin, where the family’s dynastic abbey was located. Under King Heraclius II of Georgia (r. 1744-1798), the Arghutashvili family was officially recognized as descended from the Mkhargrdzeli and elevated to a princely rank (Georgian: tavadi, Russian: knyaz), a title which was confirmed by the Imperial Russian government on March 6, 1819, December 15, 1838 and November 14, 1857.[1][2]
In contrast to the commonly accepted view, the Russian historian Pyotr Dolgorukov (1816-1868) advanced a hypothesis of the family’s Rurikid origin and attempted to trace the common ancestry of Argutinsky-Dolgorukov and the Rurikid house of Dolgorukov to the 12th-century prince Yuri Dolgoruki.[3]