The Milesian Greek colony of Tanais, destined to be the first known major city in the region of southwestern Russia, is founded late in the third century BCE on the left bank of the Don River, four miles (seven kilometers) east of the Sea of Azov.

The site of Tanais had been occupied long before the Milesians found an emporium here.

A necropolis of over three hundred burial mounds near the ancient city show that the site had already been occupied since the Bronze Age, and that mound burials continued through Greek and into even Roman times.

Greek traders seem to have been meeting nomads in the district as early as the seventh century BCE without a formal, permanent settlement.

Greek colonies have two kinds of origins, apoikiai of citizens from the mother city-state, and emporia, which are strictly trading stations.

It is a natural post, first for the trade of the steppes reaching away eastwards in an unbroken grass sea to the Altai, the Scythian Holy Land, second for the trade of the Black Sea, ringed with Greek-dominated ports and entrepôts, and third for trade from the impenetrable north, with furs and slaves brought down the Don.

Strabo mentions Tanais in his Geography (11.2.2).