Pontic Greeks - ethnic Greeks, immigrants from the Pontus region, northeastern region of Asia Minor adjacent to the Black Sea (Pontus of Euxinus). Their self-name is Romans. The ideologists of the national movement, to distinguish themselves from the inhabitants of mainland Greece, use the name Pontians. The Turks called them Urumahs.
History of Pontic Greeks
The Greeks have lived in Asia Minor since time immemorial. Before the Ottomans conquered the peninsula, the Greeks were one of several indigenous peoples here. The Greeks created the cities of Smyrna, Sinop, Samsun, Trebizond. The latter in the Middle Ages became an important trading city and the capital of the Trebizond Empire.
After the conquest of Trebizond by the Turks, its territory became part of the Shining Port. The Greeks in the Ottoman Empire were a national and religious minority. Some Pontians converted to Islam and adopted the Turkish language.
In 1878, the Greeks were equated with Muslims. At the beginning of the 20th century, separatist sentiments began to mature among the Pontic Greeks. The idea of creating a Greek state on the territory of Pontus was popular among the population.
With the outbreak of World War I, the Turkish government began to see the Pontic Greeks as an unreliable element. In 1916, they, along with Armenians and Assyrians, began to be evicted to the internal regions of the Ottoman Empire. Resettlement was accompanied by massacres and robberies. This process is often called Greek genocide. Greek rebels began an armed struggle to create an independent state.
After the Turkish troops left Pontus, power in the region passed to the Greeks. A government was formed, led by Metropolitan Chrysanthus. After the capture of the area by Turkish troops in 1918, the mass exodus of the Greeks began. Refugees were sent to Transcaucasia (Armenia and Georgia), Greece and Russia.
The remaining were relocated to Greece in 1923 as part of the Lausanne Peace Treaty, which contained an article on the Greek-Turkish population exchange. The Pontic Greeks regarded their forced departure as a national disaster. Muslims from the Balkan countries settled in their place.
