In the XIX century, Assyrians in the Russian Empire were called “Aisors.”
The first significant wave of migrants arrived in Georgia, in Tiflis, in the second half of the XIX century.
They were settlers from Persia (Iran) and the Ottoman Empire, seeking safety after the conclusion of the Treaty of Turkmenchay (1828) between Russia and Persia — an agreement that facilitated the resettlement of Persian subjects, including Assyrian Christians, into the territory of the Russian Empire.
By the end of the XIX century, the Assyrian community in Tiflis had grown to approximately 5,000 people.
The community had an Assyrian church and a three-grade parish school — important centers for preserving language, faith, and cultural identity.
Already by the late XIX and early XX centuries, Assyrians were publishing a newspaper in their native language, Madynkha (“The East”).