Tmutarakan

Tmutarakan' (Russian: Тьмутаракань, Ukrainian: Тьмуторокань) is an ancient city that controlled the passage from the Black Sea to the Sea of Azov. It was situated on the Taman peninsula, in the present-day Krasnodar Krai of Russia.

Located near the ancient Greek colony of Phanagoria, the town was built on the ruins of the minor Greek settlement of Germonassa. In the seventh century, the region fell to the Khazars, who built the fortress town of Tamatarkha. Arabic sources refer to it as Samkarsh al-Yahud (i.e., "Samkarsh the Jew"), probably indicating a Jewish majority.

Fortified with a strong brick wall and boasting a fine harbour, Samkarsh was a large city of merchants. It controlled much of the Northern European trade with the Byzantine Empire and Northern Caucasus. The inhabitants included the Greeks, Armenians, Russians, Jews, Ossetians, and Circassians. After the destruction of the Khazar empire by Svyatoslav of Rus in the mid-10th century, a Jewish Khazar principality became centered on the Taman region, though whether Tmutarakan was its capital or not is unknown.

One of the sons of Vladimir the Great, called Mstislav, was the prince of Tmutarakan from 988 to 1036. During his reign, a first stone church was dedicated to Madonna, the ruins of it being still visible. In the 12th century, the city was isolated from the Russian mainland by the Cumans and gradually declined.

The site of Tmutarakan was discovered in 1792, when a local peasant found a stone with an inscription stating that Prince Gleb had measured the sea from here to Kerch in 1068. The excavations of the site were conducted in the 19th century. In modern Russian language, Tmutarakan stands for "a distant and obscure province".