As a colony, Trapezous initially paid tribute to Sinope, but early banking (money-changing) activity is suggested to have occurred in the city already in the 4th century BC, according to a silver drachma coin from Trapezus in the British Museum, London.

Cyrus the Great added the city to the Achaemenid Empire, and was possibly the first ruler to consolidate the eastern Black Sea region into a single political entity (a satrapy).

In the 2nd century BC, the city with its natural harbours was added to the Kingdom of Pontus by Pharnaces I. Mithridates VI Eupator made it the home port of the Pontic fleet, in his quest to remove the Romans from Anatolia.

A mithraeum now serves as a crypt for the church and monastery of Panagia Theoskepastos (Kızlar Manastırı) in nearby Kizlara, east of the citadel and south of the modern harbor.

[16] By the time of Justinian, the city served as an important base in his Persian Wars, and Miller notes that a portrait of the general Belisarius "long adorned the church of St.

One of the most famous persons to have visited the city in this period was Marco Polo, who ended his overland return journey at the port of Trebizond, and sailed to his hometown Venice with a ship; passing by Constantinople (Istanbul) on the way, which was retaken by the Byzantines in 1261.

Basilios Bessarion and George of Trebizond travelled to Italy and taught and published works on Plato and Aristotle, starting a fierce debate and literary tradition that continues to this day on the topic of national identity and global citizenship.

[34] However, a significant portion of the local Christians were Islamized by the end of the 17th century - especially those outside the city - according to a research by Prof. Halil İnalcık on the Ottoman tax books (tahrir defterleri).

Trebizond had a wealthy merchant class during the late Ottoman period, and the local Christian minority had a substantial influence in terms of culture, economy and politics.

As the population of the province greatly expanded due to increased living standards, many families and young men - mostly Christians, but also some Jews and Greek or Turkish speaking Muslims - chose to migrate to the Crimea and southern Ukraine, in search for farmland or employment in one of the cities which had been newly established there.

First Trebizond would lose many of its young male citizens at the Battle of Sarikamish in the winter of 1914–15, while during those same months the Russian navy bombarded the city a total of five times, taking 1300[41] lives.

[42][43] In some areas of Trebizond province - such as the Karadere river valley in modern-day Araklı, 25 kilometers east of the city - the local Muslim population tried to protect the Christian Armenians.

Ottoman forces retreated from Trabzon, and on April 15 the city was taken without a fight by the Russian Caucasus Army under command of Grand Duke Nicholas and Nikolai Yudenich.

Ali Şükrü Bey, who had studied in Deniz Harp Okulu (Turkish Naval Academy) and worked as a journalist in the United Kingdom, is seen as a hero by the people of Trabzon, while in neighboring Giresun there is a statue of his murderer Topal Osman.

Three years later Trabzon deputy Hafız Mehmet – who had testified to his knowledge of, and opposition to, the Armenian Ggenocide – was also executed, for his alleged involvement in the İzmir plot to assassinate Mustafa Kemal.

The popular expression "perdere la Trebisonda" (losing Trebizond) is still commonly used in the Italian language to describe situations in which the sense of direction is lost.

[51] A very small percentage of the province can be classified as subtropical, however, as slightly elevated rural areas near the coast are oceanic (Cfb/Do), the mountainous offshores are humid continental (Dfb/Dc) and subarctic (Dfc/Eo); and tundra (ET/Ft) can be found in the peaks of the Pontic Alps.

This and the fact that the subtropical microclimate zone along the shore occupies a very narrow band due to the continuous parallel mountain range starting right at the coast is why local authorities still classify the city as oceanic, as this climate subtype is better representative of the entire coastal region of the province.

Precipitation is heaviest in autumn and winter, with a marked reduction in the summer months, a microclimatic condition of the city center compared to the rest of the region.

Initially, the Muslims were mainly immigrants from Anatolia with a minority of local converts, but this quickly changed with the emergence of an active missionary spirit in the 16th century, as mosques and dervish lodges were built in predominantly Christian neighborhoods.

Numerous villages inside and out of Trabzon of the Laz date back as early as the period of Queen Tamar's rule (Georgian: თამარი, also transliterated as T'amar or Thamar; c. 1160 – 18 January 1213) in the newly unified Kingdom of Georgia.

[65] Robert W. Edwards published part of an early 15th-century diary from the Castilian ambassador who visited Trabzon and compared the churches of the Greek and Armenian communities.

The Chepni people, a tribe of Oghuz Turks who played an important role in the history of the eastern Black Sea area in the 13th and 14th centuries, live in the Şalpazarı (Ağasar valley) region of the Trabzon Province.

It is possible that the majority of the population of Trabzon and Rize (another ancient Greek colony in the Pontus region) — except up to the time of the Chepni Turk immigration waves — consisted of indigenous Caucasian tribes (the Colchians and the Laz) who had been partly Hellenized religiously and linguistically.

[72] Michael Meeker stresses the cultural resemblances (e.g. in village structure, house types, and pastoral techniques) between the Eastern Black Sea coast and the areas in the Caucasus proper.

These include traditional gender roles, social conservatism, hospitality, and a willingness to help strangers; and all aspects, both positive and negative, of an agrarian lifestyle, such as hard work, poverty, strong family ties, and a closeness to nature.

The Black Sea region of Turkey is the world's largest producer of cherry and hazelnut; and a large production area of tea; all of which play an important role in the local cuisine.

Trabzonspor is also one of the most successful Turkish clubs in the European Cups, managing to beat numerous prominent teams such as Barcelona, Inter, Liverpool, Aston Villa, and Olympique Lyonnais.

Hundreds of thousands Trabzonite expatriates and fans from around the globe made their way to the city to participate in one of the first mass gatherings in the country for nearly two years, marking the end of the Corona pandemic.

Officially the pandemic-measures had not been fully lifted, which led to some criticism towards the city's municipal government for allowing the festivities to continue for hours into the night, long past curfew.