the Kerch Peninsula, at the western slope of Mount Opuk, roughly southwest of Panticapaeum. Its name may refer to an earlier Cimmerian settlement on the site. Kimmerikon would become an important stronghold defending the Bosporan Kingdom from the Scythians. Tyritake () was situated in the eastern part of Crimea, about south of Panticapaeum. It is tentatively identified with the ruins in the Kerch district of Kamysh-Burun (Arshyntseve), on the shore of the Cimmerian Bosporus. There are only few short mentions about Tyritake in ancient literary sources. Archaeological projects have established that the colony, founded about the mid-6th century BC, specialized in crafts and viticulture. In the first centuries, fishing and wine production became the economic mainstay of the town. Myrmēkion () was situated on the shore of the Cimmerian Bosporus, north of Panticapaeum. It was founded in the mid-6th century BC as an independent polis, which soon became one of the richest in the region. In the 5th century BC, the town specialized in winemaking and minted its own coinage. It was surrounded by towered walls, measuring some thick. Nymphaion () was founded by colonists from Miletus’ rival Samos between 580 and 560 BC. It was situated of about south of Panticapaeum. There is no archaeological evidence for the presence of Scythians in the area before the city's founding. The town issued its own coins and generally prospered in the period of classical antiquity from its control of the cereal trade. Athens chose Nymphaion as its principal military base in the region ca. 444 BC and Gylon, the grandfather of Demosthenes, suffered banishment from Athens on charges that he had betrayed Nymphaeum during the Peloponnesian War. It was annexed to the Bosporan Kingdom by the end of the century. In the 5th century BC, Dorians from Heraclea Pontica on the Black Sea coast of Asia Minor founded the sea port of Chersonesos in southwestern Crimea (outside modern Sevastopol). It was a site with good deep-water harbors located at the edge of the territory of the indigenous Taurians. During much of the Classical Period, Chersonesus was a democracy ruled by a group of elected archons and a council called the Demiurgi. As time passed the government grew more oligarchic, with power concentrated in the hands of the archons. Up to the middle of the 4th century BC, Chersonesos remained a small city. It then expanded to lands in northwest Crimea, incorporating