Cerasus or Kerasous () was a town of

ancient Pontus Pontus or Pontos (; ,) is a region on the southern coast of the Black Sea, located in the modern-day eastern Black Sea region of Turkey. The name was applied to the coastal region and its mountainous hinterland (rising to the Pontic Alps in the ...

, on the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

coast, a little to the west of

Trapezus Trabzon, historically known as Trebizond, is a city on the Black Sea coast of northeastern Turkey and the capital of Trabzon Province. The city was founded in 756 BC as "Trapezous" by colonists from Miletus. It was added into the Achaemenid Em ...

. The

Ten Thousand The Ten Thousand (, ''hoi Myrioi'') were a force of mercenary units, mainly Greeks, employed by Cyrus the Younger to attempt to wrest the throne of the Persian Empire from his brother, Artaxerxes II. Their march to the Battle of Cunaxa and bac ...

, in their retreat, came to

, and leaving Trapezus, "they arrive on the third day at Cerasus, an Hellenic city on the sea, a colony of the

Sinope Sinope may refer to: *Sinop, Turkey, a city on the Black Sea, historically known as Sinope ** Battle of Sinop, 1853 naval battle in the Sinop port *Sinop Province * Sinope, Leicestershire, a hamlet in the Midlands of England * Sinope (mythology), i ...

is, in Colchis." The Anonymous

geographer of Ravenna The ''Ravenna Cosmography'' (, "The Cosmography of the Unknown Ravennese") is a work describing the known world from India to Ireland, compiled by an anonymous cleric in Ravenna around 700 AD. It consists of five books describing Asia, ...

places Cerasus 60 stadia east of Coralla, and 90 west of Hieron Oros, and on a river of the same name. The name, and possibly the population, of the town were translated to

Pharnacia ''Pharnacia''Stål C (1877) ''Öfversigt af Kongliga Vetenskaps-Akademiens Förhandlingar'' 34 (10): 40. is a tropical Asian genus of stick insects in the family Phasmatidae and subfamily Clitumninae (tribe Pharnaciini). Some species formerly pl ...

in the

Hellenistic era In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, which was followed by the ascendancy of the Roma ...

. Its site is tentatively located near Gelida Kale in Asiatic Turkey.

References

Populated places in ancient Pontus Former populated places in Turkey History of Trabzon Province {{AncientPontus-geo-stub