Geography 340: Urban
Systems
Day 2 – A Brief History of Cities
Click here to add text
Click here to add text. Click here to add text.
Click here to add text. Click here to add text.
Click here to add text. Click here to add text.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• Cities have existed for at least 5500-9000 years.
• In addition to studying cities, geographers are
concerned with urban systems – the functional
territories with which cities are interrelated.
• How would you define a city, what distinguishes
urban from rural?
• As they note, there were 5 hearths for the emergence
of cities (I would say 6) – see p. 23 – and
Tenochtitlán in Mexico was, at the time of the
Spanish conquest, far more imposing and populous
than contemporary European cities (only Paris and
Constantinople were bigger).
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• After the collapse of the Roman Empire, cities largely
disappeared in Europe for a period of about 500
years, when they began to slowly re-establish
themselves especially under the impetus of growth of
trade.
• Under the feudal system and the growing centralized
monarchies, cities were able to carve out varying
degrees of autonomy, and there was an expression
that “city air makes one free.” Serfs who managed to
hide out in a city for more than a year were declared
freemen.
• Cities also created alliances for economic gain, such
as the Hanseatic League.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• As the authors point out, cities presuppose agricultural
societies capable of generating a surplus. This required
favourable environmental conditions, which in turn were often
enhanced by irrigation and other technological breakthroughs.
• There are different theories as to why people turned to
agriculture. Some suggest that it was the result of
experiments in plant and animal domestication; others that
climate change drove hunters and gatherers to find alternative
ways of surviving. If population pressure helped drive the
creation of agriculture, it is also the case that a reliable source
of food greatly facilitated population growth.
• However it happened, the net result was that people became
sedentary and eventually started producing a surplus – a
precondition for cities and civilizations, which are closely
linked (civitas is the Latin word for city).
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• Mesopotamia is probably home to the earliest cities
(and civilizations) such Ur, Uruk, Enkidu, Sumer, and
Babylon.
Artist’s conception of Babylon:
Maurice Bardon
Ruins of City of Ur in Iraq: Wikipedia
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• A minority of authors believe that cities emerged from the
necessity of having nodes from which long-distance trading
could be conducted. Certainly, trade was facilitated.
• But whatever was the reason, cities (and civilizations) came
to be, they led to an increasingly sophisticated division of
labour, with mental workers (rulers, priests, accountants,
scribes, and proto-scientists), and menial workers
(peasants, construction workers, soldiers, craftsmen), with
soldiers and craftsmen probably occupying a status
somewhat above that of the peasants and builders.
• This hierarchical structure of civilization seems to be
universal – in the New World and in the Old – with the
possible exception of Çatalhöyük (for location, see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%87atalh%C3%B6y%C3%BCk).
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• Cities also served a defense
purpose, but they also often
became the launching point for
aggressive empires.
• Cities became sites for major
temples and religious festivals
and ceremonies, and this
contributed to their prestige
and that of their rulers.
Religion also helped reinforce
the status quo by suggesting
that it was divinely ordained
(rulers were often seen as
gods or close to the gods).
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• In addition to Mesopotamia, cities emerged in Egypt,
modern-day India/ Pakistan (Harappa/ Mohenjo-Daro),
in northern China, and later in Mexico, the Yucatan,
and Peru.
• At a later date, cities
developed in places
like Khmer (Cambodia),
and the Mediterranean
(Syria, Lebanon, Israel,
and Greece).
• Some had an organic
layout, others a
gridiron. Some had
walls and some did not.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• With the rise of empires (Persian, Assyrian, Greek, Roman,
and European), cities were established with varying models in
other parts of the world.
• Cities also emerged along
trade routes (the Silk Road).
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• Cities were to some degree dependent on their resource
basis. If they overextended themselves, as the Mayan
cities were thought to have done, they collapsed.
• The alternative was to establish empires which, in
essence, forced other regions to pay tribute and provide
resources through a network of colonial cities and
territories.
• Greek cities, with the exception of Athens at its peak,
were quite small. Rome started out small but eventually
attained a million people, with the most sophisticated
infrastructure that had existed to that point.
• The Roman empire, in turn, founded many of what we
now know as modern European cities – London,
Brussels, Paris, Cologne, Vienna, Sofia, and Belgrade.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• After the fall of the Roman empire, cities in Europe went
into decline, and torch of urbanity and civilization passed to
the Muslim world, who founded Teheran, Basra, Mosul,
Karbala, Cairo, and Tangiers, in addition to revitalizing
Mecca, Medina, Baghdad and Damascus. The Arabs also
founded cities in Saharan or sub-Saharan Africa:
Timbucto, Kano, and Mombasa.
• Muslim-influenced cities and architecture/ culture also
flourished in Spain. As the eastern capital of post-Roman
Christianity, Constantinople also survived and thrived for a
time.
• Such towns as remained in Europe tended to be
ecclesiastical, university-related, or for defense-purposes.
• Nonetheless, out of these unpromising beginnings, the
future of European global domination began.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• Gradually, merchant capitalism began
to supplant feudalism, which had
been based on largely self-sufficient
manors. Economic activity quickened.
It began to be in the interest of
barons and kings to encourage
settlement in planned new towns
because of the revenues generated
through market tolls, rents, and court
fines.
• Most cities in Europe to this day
share certain common elements.The
cathedral and the town hall tend to be
at the centre, and this is where daily
or weekly markets were and are held.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• At the end of 13th century, Europe had approximately 3000 cities, containing about 15-20% of the
total population, but most had less than 2000
people. Paris was the largest with about 275,000.
• Trade in and between Hanseatic League cities (see
page 38) greatly expanded the economy, the wealth
of the merchant class, and provided the impetus for
overseas exploration and conquest.
• With the rise of the absolute monarchies,
centralized nation-states began to replace the loose
network of principalities in at least some European
countries, and gave capitals an added purpose of
serving an administrative function for kings.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• During the Age of Exploration (“Conquest”), wealth
poured into Europe and European cities from the
slave trade, and staple production (sugar, cotton,
tea, and tobacco production, mining for precious
metals, and collection of spices).
• The next big game changer, funded by this wealth,
was the Industrial Revolution, with Manchester,
England, as the poster child for the new order.
Fossil fuels, steam engines, huge factories, and
subject workers became the order of the day.
William Blake referred to the new factories as “dark
satanic mills.” (See the image on p. 41.)
• Here’s Friederich Engels on Manchester.
Chapter 2: The Origin and Growth of Cities
• Higher productivity, through the introduction of
machinery, and enclosure of lands in the rural
areas, released large numbers of former peasants
to become potential members of the working class,
much as is occurring today in many developing
countries.
• The Industrial Revolution in the UK Midlands soon
spread to other parts of Europe. Poor wages and
inability to rent decent housing led to overcrowding
and slum living conditions, including in North
America, at a great cost to health.
• Soon, the urban population of Europe shifted from
being 3-5% in 1800 to 16% in 1850, with 900 cities
of more than 100,000 people.