[Cronos]

It’s interesting though, when I read Gibbon (”Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire”)it is stated that Alexander met Greek-speeking people in Asia Minor when he went there. That was centuries before Christ.

All of what is now the coastline of Turkey was Greek, with Greek cities (some like milene were founded even by the Assyrians in 700 BC or earlier).

Also Greeks traded along the coast of the Black sea right up to the borders with Colchic (an ancient Kartvelian (Georgian) civilisation) -- the origins of the myth of the Argonauts.

Finally, the Greeks were mercenaries at least since the days of Cyrus the Great (500 BC) and probably earlier during the heydays of the neo-Assyrian empire.

i think they are mentioned in neo-Assyrian records as the barbaric people from the north.

[SMARTY]

All of my grandparents came from an area in N. central Turkey.

It’s just a little bit inland from the S. coast of the Black Sea.

I guess there were silver mines there at one time, but long since all played out.

Mostly, they kept sheep and goats. The land was not good for farming. They must have traded for essentials and what they couldn't make or grow themselves. They kept the animals on the lowland during winter, and moved up with the flocks into the mountains in the spring.

In centuries passed, the area was part of the old overland ‘Silk Road. I've seen photos of it and it all looks like Montana.P> Before Columbus proved you could get E. by going W., it was kind of busy with caravan trade and etc. Once the sea route was established, it became a backwater.

The Greeks there, were some of the earliest Christians. When Muslims first occupied the place, there were more or less tolerant... that changed.