Twelve Greek Colonies from Emporion to Pantikapaion, West to East

Empúries began as Emporion, meaning trading place, founded in 575 BC by Greeks from Phocaea. Its ruins today preserve two adjoining ancient cities, Palaiapolis and Neapolis, along with extensive Roman remains.

Massalia was settled around 600 BC by Ionian Greeks from Phocaea and became the center of Greek trade in the western Mediterranean. It founded outposts along the coasts of Spain, southern France and northwestern Italy, and its ruins lie within modern Marseille.

Cumae was the first Greek colony of Magna Graecia on the Italian mainland, founded by settlers from Euboea in the 8th century BC. Its remains lie around Cuma, divided between Pozzuoli and Bacoli near Naples.

Velia was founded by Greek settlers from Phocaea around 538 to 535 BC under the name Hyele, near the modern village of Ascea. It is best known as the home of the Eleatic school of philosophy, associated with Parmenides and Zeno of Elea.

Megara Hyblaea was a Greek colony in Sicily, on the east coast about 20 kilometers north-northwest of Syracuse. Ancient sources describe at least three Sicilian cities named Hybla, which are often confused with one another.

Epizephyrian Locris was founded in the 7th century BC by settlers from Locris in central Greece, the last Greek colony established in Calabria. It became known for producing athletes who competed in the Panhellenic Games.

Sybaris was founded around 720 BC by Achaean and Troezenian settlers on the Gulf of Taranto. It grew so wealthy that the word sybarite comes from its name, and its rival Kroton destroyed it around 510 BC.

Phocaea sits on the Anatolian coast near modern Foca and is the mother city of this path, since it founded Massalia and Elea in southern Italy. Much of its population emigrated rather than submit to the Persians in the sixth century BC, as Herodotus records.

Histria, also called Istros, was a Greek colony near the mouth of the Danube on the western Black Sea coast. Its ruins now lie beside the lagoon of Lake Sinoe, about 70 kilometers from the river bank.

Tyras was founded by colonists from Miletus around 600 BC near the mouth of the Dniester, on the site of modern Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi. It traded in wheat, wine and fish, and the Romans rebuilt it under Nero in 56 AD.

Naucratis was the principal Greek trading settlement permitted in Egypt under the Saite pharaohs, in the Nile Delta. Its Hellenion was a shared sanctuary built jointly by several East Greek cities.

Pantikapaion was founded by Milesian colonists in the late 7th or early 6th century BC, on the site of modern Kerch in Crimea. It was ruled by the Archaeanactids and then the Spartocids, and Mithridates VI of Pontus died there.