The fortress overlooked a strategic locale, controlling roads to the Greater Caucasus mountains, inhabited by the bellicose Georgian highlanders of Tusheti, Pshavi, and Khevsureti.
The battle at Bakhtrioni, and the heroism of the mountaineers, inspired Vazha-Pshavela his epic poem Bakhtrioni (1892), while Akaki Tsereteli wrote a whole novel about it, Bashi-Achuki.