History of Pontus

thumb|right|380px|Tibareni occupied the country between the Chalybes and the [[Mosynoeci, on the east of the river Iris.]]

250px|thumb|Mosinoeci (lower centre) in a map of the voyage of the Argonauts by [[Abraham Ortelius, 1624]] Mossynoeci (, , , modern Greek '''', "dwellers in wooden towers") is a name that the Greeks of the Euxine Sea (Black Sea) applied to the peoples of Pontus, the northern Anatolian coast west of Trebizond. The Mossynoeci were believed to be of proto-Georgian origin.

The Phasians ( Pazielebi; Phasianoi; ) were an ancient tribe located in the eastern part of Pontus. The Greek commander Xenophon, who encountered them during his march through Asia Minor to the Black Sea (401–400 BC), places them on the river Phasis. Here, the Phasis of Xenophon is not the common Graeco-Roman designation for the modern day Rioni River in Georgia (called Phasis in Greek), but rather the sources of Araxes in what is now northeastern Turkey. At the time when Xenophon met them, the Phasians were in control of the long valley to the north of Cilligül Dağ, and lived in the neighborh