In 1876 the Russian scholar Philipp Bruun published a work entitled The Migrations of Prester John, in which he challenged the whole notion that Bishop Hugh's story was a distorted version of the exploits of Yeh·lu Ta-shih. According to Bruun, the prototype of Prester John was the general Ivané (John) Orhelian, commander-in-chief of the army of the kingdom of Georgia. This John Orhelian is One of his f country's national heroes, who fought valiantly for many years to drive the Turks from the Caucasus. In 1123-24 he recaptured from the Seljuks a wide strip of territory in eastern Georgia, including the cities of Tiflis and Ani, and his grateful monarch, King David the Restorer, bestowed on him large grants of land in the reconquered region.

Bruun raised the interesting point that Otto of Freising apparently confused the Georgian city of Ani with the old Persian city of Ecbatana. In a passage of Otto's chronicle somewhat earlier than the Prester John anecdote, Otto, in providing some geographical information apparently received from Bishop Hugh, remarked, "The kings of the Persians ... . have themselves established the seat of their kingdom at Ecbatana, which ... in their tongue is called Rani." The defeat of the Seljuks at Ani in 1123 thus begins to seem a more plausible source for Prester John's victory at Ecbatana than does the triumph of Yeh-lü Ta-shih outside Samarkand.  Moreover, John Orbelian was a Christian-- Greek Orthodox, though, and not Nestorian. And, though he was neither a king nor a priest, the Georgian general did conduct himself in regal fashion: he dined on silver dishes, had the privilege of sitting on a couch at royal banquets while the other princes sat merely on cushions, and the Orbelian family held the hereditary right to provide over the cornations of Georgian kings.