Armenian Pontus

The Trebizond-Black Sea Communities

Edited by Richard G. Hovannisian

The golden plains and mountain ribs of the Armenian Plateau are separated from the semitropical Black Sea littoral by the imposing Pontic mountain range. Nevertheless, associations between Armenia and Pontus date back to the era of the Persian Achaemenian Empire beginning in the sixth century B.C. Later, 401-400 B.C. the Greeek general Xenophon traversed the Armenian Plateau as an escape route from the Persian heartlands to Trapezus (Trabizond) on the black sea, his account of that adventurous journey affording one of the earliest written descriptions of ancient Armenia.

Thriving Armenian communities developed all along the narrow corridor from Batum in the east to Samsun in the west, while the curious Armenian enclave of Hamshen in the eastern Pontic hinterland retained much of its Armenian character long after its population was forcibly Islamisized in the 17th and 18th centuries.

This is the 8th in the Historic Armenian Cities and Provinces series, with contributions from distinguished scholars.

EB 819 SC 453 pgs. $ 30.00

ISBN9781568591551