Kolkheti National Park

In pre-Hellenistic Greco-Roman geography, Colchis was an exonym for the Georgian kingdom and region of Egrisi located on the coast of the Black Sea, centred in present-day western Georgia. It has been described in modern scholarship as the earliest Georgian formation which, along with the Kingdom of Iberia, would later contribute significantly to the development of the medieval Georgian statehood and the Georgian nation.Internationally, Colchis is perhaps best known for its role in Greek mythology, most notably as the destination of the Argonauts, as well as the home to Medea and the Golden fleece. It was also described as a land rich with gold, iron, timber and honey that would export its resources mostly to ancient Greece.Colchis was populated by Colchians, an early Kartvelian-speaking tribe, ancestral to the contemporary Western Georgians, namely Svans and Mingrelians, as well as the related Lazs. Its geography is mostly assigned to what is now the western part of Georgia and encompasses the present-day Georgian provinces of Samegrelo, Imereti, Guria, Adjara, Abkhazeti, Svaneti, Racha; modern Russia’s Sochi and Tuapse districts; and present-day Turkey’s Rize, Trabzon and Artvin provinces.
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