Kolesnykov K. Customs Relations in the Northern Black Sea Region in Ancient Times: the Problems of Interpretation

Object: The political-economic structure of Tyra, Olbia, Chersoneses, Bosporus, Roman Empire, related to the customs and tax managements, and their reflection in the sources and historiography. Objective: To determine the probabilities of reconstructing the history of customs relations in the northern Black Sea region of ancient times and the reconstruction (or simulation) of these relations. Principles: objectivity, systematic, historicism, interdisciplinary approach, some provisions of the doctrine of "linguistic turn". Methods : A historical and logical, comparative, retrospective, chronological reconstruction and modeling, formulary and diplomatic analysis. This dissertation is the first research in the historiography where the results of a long study of the ancient customs relations of the Northern Black Sea coast in the historical science are summarized concerning the different narrative, epigraphic, numismatic and historiographical sources. The author's conception of the role of customs regulation and other ways of regulation of foreign economic relations in antiquity is suggested. The author has also reconstructed ancient customs infrastructure of the Northern Black Sea and analyzed the political and historical factors having influenced the process of its development. This dissertation defines the role of international trade agreements to ensure the grain trade of Bosporus with Athens and Mytilene (Lesbos). The thesis provides a comprehensive historical study of customs activities, who performed one of the mechanisms of incorporation of the North Pontus in the Roman Empire. The special emphasis is put on the genesis of historiographic concepts being formed around the issues of taxation and customs relations in connection with the problems of the international legal status of Tyra, Olbia, Chersoneses, Bosporus in the Roman age. Application areas: training and teaching of academic disciplines in higher education.