Phanagoria
Phanagoria was founded in the middle of the sixth century BCE on the Taman Peninsula, beside the waters linking the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. The city remained part of the northern Black Sea world for more than a thousand years. Its history reached from the archaic Greek period into the early Middle Ages, with changes in rulers, religion, architecture, and trade along the way.
The site is unusually broad. Archaeologists work on the upper and lower plateaus, the acropolis, the necropolises, and the part of the city that now lies underwater. A modern visitor sees exposed ruins, but much of Phanagoria is still held in the ground and beneath the water.
A city on a changing coast
Phanagoria's position made it valuable. The peninsula sat along routes used by ships and by people travelling around the northern Black Sea. A city here could take part in maritime trade while remaining close to the steppe and the communities beyond the coast.
The settlement changed as the surrounding political world changed. It belonged at different times to Greek, Bosporan, Roman, and later regional spheres of power. Those labels describe political connections rather than a succession of clean breaks. Houses, streets, workshops, and religious buildings were repaired, rebuilt, or covered by later occupation.
Its foundation as a Greek city did not make Phanagoria a small copy of a city in the Aegean. Local conditions shaped the buildings, the economy, and the way residents used the shoreline. A port city is always partly made by its connections, but it is also made by the ground on which it stands.
The acropolis
The acropolis covers more than 3,000 square metres. Excavations have identified public, civic, and cult buildings, as well as defensive walls from the second half of the sixth century and the early fifth century BCE. Some of those walls were built from mudbrick, a practical material in a region where fired brick and stone were used selectively.
The acropolis was more than a high point on the site. It concentrated buildings connected with authority and public life. The remains allow archaeologists to ask where people gathered, how the city was defended, and how religious activity was placed within the urban plan.
One palace complex has been identified as the residence of Mithridates VI Eupator. It was destroyed during an uprising in 63 BCE, when the king's rule over the Bosporan Kingdom was challenged. The destruction layer offers a rare historical anchor, but it does not explain every action that led to the fire. Buildings can preserve the moment of destruction while leaving the motives outside the surviving evidence.
Streets, houses, and water
The lower plateau contains layers from later periods, including dense early medieval occupation from the eighth and early ninth centuries CE. Houses stood beside paved streets, drainage channels, wells, and other installations. These details show a settlement dealing with ordinary urban problems: moving water, disposing of waste, reaching neighbours, and keeping buildings usable.
The city was destroyed in the early tenth century CE. That ending came after a long sequence of rebuilding. Phanagoria therefore cannot be understood as one Greek foundation preserved unchanged. Its earliest walls and its medieval houses belong to different communities that inherited the same ground.
Other excavations have revealed evidence for craft production and wine-making. A wine installation dating to the fourth century CE shows how local production fitted into a wider economy. The installation is a physical reminder that trade depended on work inside the city: pressing, storing, repairing containers, and moving the finished product.
The city below the water
Part of ancient Phanagoria is submerged. Underwater archaeology has been a major part of the research programme for more than two decades. The underwater remains may preserve walls, harbour features, and objects that are difficult to interpret on land, where later construction and erosion have altered the surface.
The submerged area also records changes to the coast. Shorelines move, water levels change, and buildings can end up below the modern surface through a mixture of natural processes and human activity. Archaeologists must therefore study the city as both an urban settlement and a coastal landscape.
The necropolises add another perspective. The Eastern and Southern cemeteries include burials from different periods, while the Boyur-Gora kurgan contains a round crypt dating to the fourth century BCE. Tombs show how people represented family, status, age, and belonging. They also preserve objects that may never appear in ordinary houses.
Excavating a long history
The Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences has conducted wide-ranging excavations at Phanagoria. Work covers a sequence from the sixth century BCE to the tenth century CE, and the absence of modern buildings across large parts of the site makes broad investigation possible.
That freedom comes with a responsibility. A large site can produce a long list of impressive discoveries, but each object belongs to a layer, a building, a grave, or a shoreline. The value of Phanagoria lies in keeping those contexts together.
Phanagoria was a Greek city, a Bosporan city, a port, a place of worship, a workshop, and a medieval settlement. None of those descriptions cancels the others. The city survived by changing, and the archaeological work is still uncovering what each change left behind.