He was well born and very well educated. After serving in the army in 1812, like most patriotic young Russians of the day, he entered the foreign office, in 1817. There he probably made the acquaintance of Pushkin, but he never became intimate with him, as he belonged to a different literary circle, which included actors and dramatic writers. His first dramatic efforts were not very promising, though his first comedy, "The Young Married Pair," was acted in St. Petersburg in 1816. In 1819 he was offered the post of secretary of legation in Persia, which he accepted; and this took him away from the gay and rather wild society existence which he was leading, with bad results in many ways. In Persia, despite his multifarious occupations, and his necessary study of Oriental languages, Griboyedoff found time to plan his famous comedy in 1821, and in 1822 he wrote it in Georgia, whither he had been transferred. But he remodeled and rewrote portions of it, and it was finished only in 1823, when he spent a year in Moscow, his native city. When it was entirely ready for acting, he went to St. Petersburg, but neither his most strenuous efforts, nor his influence in high quarters, sufficed to secure the censor's permission for its performance on stage, or to get the requisite license for printing it. But it circulated in innumerable manuscript copies, and every one was in raptures over it. Even the glory of Pushkin's "Evgeny Onyegin," which appeared at about the same time, did not overshadow Griboyedoff's glory. Strange to say, Pushkin, who had magnified Delvig, Baratynsky, and Yazykoff far above their merits, and in general, was accustomed to overrate all talent, whether it belonged to his own friends or to strangers, was extremely severe on Griboyedoff's comedy, and detected many grave defects in it. Griboyedoff was greatly irritated by his failure to obtain proper public recognition of his comedy. He expressed his feelings freely, became more embittered than ever against mankind in general, and went back to Georgia, in 1825, where he added to his previous poems, and took part in the campaign against Persia, in which he rendered great services to the commander-in-chief. As a reward, he was sent to St. Petersburg (1828), to present the treaty of peace to the Emperor. He was promptly appointed minister plenipotentiary to Persia, and on his way thither, in Tiflis, married a Georgian princess. His stern course of action and his disregard of certain rooted Oriental customs aroused the priesthood and the ignorant masses of Teheran against him, and a riot broke out. After a heroic defense of the legation, all the Russians, including Griboyedoff, were torn to pieces. His wife had been left behind in Tabreez and escaped. She buried his remains at a monastery near Tiflis, in accordance with a wish which he had previously expressed.