40°36′N 38°00′E / 40.6°N 38.0°E
Pontus or Pontos (/ˈpɒntəs/; Greek: Πόντος, romanized: Póntos, lit. 'sea',) is a region within Anatolia on the southern coast of the Black Sea, located in the modern-day eastern Black Sea region of Turkey, in West Asia. The name was applied to the coastal region and its mountainous hinterland (rising to the Pontic Alps in the east) by the Greeks who colonized the area in the Archaic period and derived from the Greek name of the Black Sea: Εύξεινος Πόντος (Eúxinos Póntos), 'Hospitable Sea', or simply Pontos (ὁ Πόντος) as early as the Aeschylean Persians (472 BC) and Herodotus' Histories (c. 440 BC).