Poti

Poti ფოთი
Poti city center
Flag Seal
Poti ფოთი Location of Poti in Georgia
Coordinates: 42°09′0″N 41°40′0″E / 42.15000°N 41.66667°E / 42.15000; 41.66667
Country	Georgia
Mkhare	Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti
Established	7th century BC
Elevation	0 m (0 ft)
Population (2012)
• Total	47,900
Time zone	Georgian Time (UTC+4)
Website	www.poti.ge (eng)

Coordinates: 42°08′31″N 41°40′35″E / 42.14194°N 41.67639°E / 42.14194; 41.67639

Poti (Georgian: ფოთი [pʰɔtʰi]; Mingrelian: ფუთი; Laz: ჶაში/Faşi or ფაში/Paşi) is a port city in Georgia, located on the eastern Black Sea coast in the region of Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti in the west of the country. Built near the site of the ancient Greek colony of Phasis and deriving its name from the same, the city has become a major port city and industrial center since the early 20th century. It is also home to a main naval base and the headquarters of the Georgian navy. Adjacent to the Poti port area is the RAKIA owned Free Industrial Zone. Inaugurated in April 2008, it has registered a number of businesses, including those from Iranian businesspeople trying to evade sanctions against Iran.

The name Poti is apparently linked to Phasis, but the etymology is a matter of a scholarly dispute. "Phasis" (Greek: Φάσις) is first recorded in Hesiod's Theogony (c. 700 BC) as a name of the river, not a town. Since Erich Diehl, 1938, first suggested a non-Hellenic origin of the name and asserted that Phasis might have been a derivative of a local hydronym, several explanations have been proposed, linking the name to the Georgian-Zan *Poti, Svan *Pasid, and even to a Semitic word, meaning "a gold river".