Myrmēkion ( el, Μυρμήκιον, russian: Мирмекий) was an ancient
Greek colony
Greek colonization was an organised colonial expansion by the Archaic Greeks into the Mediterranean Sea and Black Sea in the period of the 8th–6th centuries BC.
This colonization differed from the migrations of the Greek Dark Ages in that i ...
in the
Crimea
Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...
. The settlement was founded in the eastern part of the modern city
Kerch
Kerch ( uk, Керч; russian: Керчь, ; Old East Slavic: Кърчевъ; Ancient Greek: , ''Pantikápaion''; Medieval Greek: ''Bosporos''; crh, , ; tr, Kerç) is a city of regional significance on the Kerch Peninsula in the east of t ...
, 4 km NE of ancient
Panticapaeum
Panticapaeum ( grc-gre, Παντικάπαιον , from Scythian , "fish-path") was an ancient Greek city on the eastern shore of Crimea, which the Greeks called Taurica. The city lay on the western side of the Cimmerian Bosporus, and was found ...
on
the bank of the Kerch bay near the cape Karantinny. The settlement was founded by
Ionians
The Ionians (; el, Ἴωνες, ''Íōnes'', singular , ''Íōn'') were one of the four major tribes that the Greeks considered themselves to be divided into during the ancient period; the other three being the Dorians, Aeolians, and Achae ...
in the first half of the 6th c. BC.
Myrmekion
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In the 5th century BC, the town specialized in winemaking and minted its own coinage. It was surrounded by towered walls, measuring some 2.5 metres thick. Myrmekion fell into the hands of the Bosporan kings in the 4th century BC and gradually dwindled into insignificance in the shadow of their capital, Panticapaeum. Regular excavations began in 1934 undertaken by an expedition led by V.F. Gaidukevich. The site was excavated by Polish archaeologists, led by Kazimierz Michałowski
Kazimierz Józef Marian Michałowski (born December 14, 1901 in Tarnopol – January 1, 1981 in Warsaw) was a Polish archaeologist and Egyptologist, art historian, member of the Polish Academy of Sciences, professor ordinarius of the Univer ...
, in the 1950s. Between 1982 and 1994 an expedition led by Yu.A. Vinogradov was working at the site. In 1999 an archaeological expedition of the State Hermitage Museum
The State Hermitage Museum ( rus, Государственный Эрмитаж, r=Gosudarstvennyj Ermitaž, p=ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)ɨj ɪrmʲɪˈtaʂ, links=no) is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is the list of ...
began work at the site.
See also
* List of ancient Greek cities
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby union ...
References
External links
The official website of the Hermitage Museum archaeological expedition in Myrmekion
Myrmekion
{{coord, 45.3534, 36.5224, format=dms, type:city_region:UA, display=title
Greek colonies in Crimea
Former populated places in Eastern Europe
Kerch
Cultural heritage monuments of federal significance in Crimea