In the wake of the Bolshevik seizure of power in Petrograd, regional leaders formed the Transcaucasian Commissariat in Tiflis (Tbilisi) as a provisional governing authority for Transcaucasia—an institutional predecessor to the later federation.
The Armistice of Erzincan ended active fighting between Ottoman and Russian forces on the Caucasus front, creating a rapidly shifting security vacuum that helped propel Transcaucasian political reorganization in 1918.
The Transcaucasian Seim opened in Tiflis as a representative assembly of Transcaucasia, bringing together major Georgian, Armenian, and Muslim/Azerbaijani political factions and marking a step away from authority centered in Petrograd.
The Soviet government’s Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (ending Russia’s role in World War I) reshaped borders and claims in the region, enabling renewed Ottoman pressure on Transcaucasia and intensifying the Seim’s statehood crisis.
Delegations from the Ottoman Empire and Transcaucasian authorities met at the Trebizond Peace Conference, attempting (unsuccessfully) to define peace terms amid Ottoman advances and the collapsing Russian imperial framework.
Clashes in Baku (30 March–2 April) sharply altered political control in the city and deepened Armenian–Muslim/Azerbaijani polarization; the upheaval soon contributed to Bolshevik-led governance there.
Following the March Days, Bolsheviks under Stepan Shaumyan proclaimed the Baku Commune, further complicating Transcaucasian politics by placing the key oil center under a rival revolutionary authority.
Ottoman forces took Batumi during their April 1918 advance, increasing pressure on Transcaucasian leaders in Tiflis and narrowing their negotiating leverage.
The Transcaucasian Seim declared the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR) an independent state, seeking unified authority over Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan to negotiate and resist external threats.
At Batumi, Ottoman representatives pressed new territorial and strategic demands beyond Brest-Litovsk terms, worsening fissures among Georgian, Armenian, and Azerbaijani leaders and pushing the federation toward collapse.
The Seim held its final session in Tiflis and formally dissolved the TDFR, acknowledging that unified federal governance could not be sustained under military pressure and divergent national goals.
Immediately after the Seim’s dissolution, Georgian leaders adopted the Act/Declaration of Independence, establishing the Democratic Republic of Georgia and ending Georgia’s participation in the federative framework.
Azerbaijani political leaders proclaimed the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic, part of the rapid succession of state formations following the collapse of the Transcaucasian federation.
Armenian leaders declared the First Republic of Armenia, completing the federation’s fragmentation into separate national republics under acute security and humanitarian pressures.
The Ottoman Empire signed the Treaty of Batum with Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, imposing major territorial and strategic terms and concluding the immediate Ottoman–Transcaucasian negotiations that had helped unravel the federation.
Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (March–May 1918)
