Taman Peninsula

Coordinates: 45°11′08″N 36°47′28″E / 45.18556°N 36.79111°E / 45.18556; 36.79111

The Taman Peninsula (Russian: Таманский полуостров), a peninsula in the present-day Krasnodar Krai of Russia, borders on the north with the Sea of Azov, on the west with the Strait of Kerch and on the south with the Black Sea. The area has evolved over the past two millennia from a chain of islands into today's peninsula. In ancient times the Pontic Greek colonies of Hermonassa and Phanagoria stood on the peninsula, as did the later city of Tmutarakan.

The Maeotae and Sindi settled in the area from ancient times. In the classical period it became part of the Bosporan kingdom; its inhabitants included Sarmatians, Greeks, Anatolian settlers from Pontus, and Jews. In the 4th century CE the area fell to the Huns; it was later the capital of Great Bulgaria and fell to the Khazars in the mid-7th century. Following the breakup of the Khazar Khaganate in c. 969, the peninsula formed part of a Khazar Jewish successor state under a ruler named David. By the late 980s it came largely into the possession of the Kievan Rus and of the Russian Principality of Tmutarakan before falling to the Kipchaks c. 1100. The Mongols seized the area in 1239 and it became a possession of Genoa, along with Gazaria in Crimea, in 1419.