Editing City (section)

===Middle Ages===
[[File:Vyborg SevernyVal3-5 006 8242.jpg|thumb|[[Vyborg]] in Leningrad Oblast has existed since the 13th century.]]
[[File:Monumentale torens in de binnenstad.jpg|thumb|Old city of [[Utrecht]], Netherlands]]
[[File:Holy Roman Empire 1648 Imperial cities.png|thumb|The [[Free imperial city|Free imperial cities]] of the [[Holy Roman Empire]] in 1648]]
[[File:Haarlem-City-Map-1550.jpg|thumb|A map of [[Haarlem]] in the Netherlands, created around 1550, shows the city completely surrounded by a [[defensive wall|city wall]] and [[moat|defensive canal]], with its square shape inspired by the shape of [[Jerusalem]].]]
The [[Fall of the Western Roman Empire|dissolution of the Roman Empire]] in the West was connected with profound changes in urban fabric of western Europe.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Wickham |first=Chris |title=Framing the early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean 400-800 |date=2006 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-921296-5 |edition=First published in paperback |location=Oxford New York, NY |pages=591–692}}</ref> In places where Roman administration quickly weakened urbanism went through a profound crisis, even if it continued to remain an important symbolic factor.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Fafinski |first=Mateusz |title=Roman infrastructure in early medieval Britain: the adaptations of the past in text and stone |date=2021 |publisher=Amsterdam University Press |isbn=978-90-485-5197-2 |series=Early medieval North Atlantic |location=Amsterdam |pages=83–142}}</ref> In regions like Italy or Spain cities diminished in size but nevertheless continued to play a key role in both the economy and government.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Osland |first=Daniel |date=2023-09-02 |title=The Role of Cities in the Early Medieval Economy |journal=Al-Masāq |language=en |volume=35 |issue=3 |pages=343–363 |doi=10.1080/09503110.2023.2211882 |issn=0950-3110|doi-access=free }}</ref> [[Late antiquity#Cities|Late antique cities]] in the East were also undergoing intense transformations, with increased political participation of the crowds and demographic fluctuations.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=de Oliveira |first=Julio Cesar Magalhães |date=2020-11-01 |title=Late Antiquity: The Age of Crowds?* |url=https://academic.oup.com/past/article/249/1/3/5819584 |journal=Past & Present |language=en |issue=249 |pages=3–52 |doi=10.1093/pastj/gtz063 |issn=0031-2746|url-access=subscription }}</ref> Christian communities and their doctrinal differences increasingly shaped the urban fabric.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Fafinski |first=Mateusz |date=2024-04-04 |title=A Restless City: Edessa and Urban Actors in the Syriac Acts of the Second Council of Ephesus |journal=Al-Masāq |language=en |pages=1–25 |doi=10.1080/09503110.2024.2331915 |issn=0950-3110|doi-access=free }}</ref> The locus of power shifted to [[Constantinople]] and to the [[Early Muslim conquests|ascendant Islamic civilization]] with its major cities [[Baghdad]], [[Cairo]], and [[Córdoba, Spain|Córdoba]].<ref>Kaplan et al. (2004), p. 43. "Capitals like Córdoba and Cairo had populations of about 500,000; Baghdad probably had a population of more than 1 million. This urban heritage would continue despite the conquests of the Seljuk Turks and the later Crusades. China, the longest standing civilization, was in the midst of a golden age as the Tang dynasty gave way—after a short period of fragmentation—to the Song dynasty. This dynasty ruled two of the most impressive cities on the planet, Xian and Hangzhou. / In contrast, poor Western Europe had not recovered from the sacking of Rome and the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. For more than five centuries a steady process of deurbanization—whereby the population living in cities and the number of cities declined precipitously—had converted a prosperous landscape into a scary wilderness, overrun with bandits, warlords, and rude settlements."</ref> From the 9th through the end of the 12th century, [[Constantinople]], the capital of the [[Eastern Roman Empire]], was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe, with a population approaching 1 million.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Cameron|first=Averil|title=The Byzantines|page=47|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=59c6PSa5JCAC|publisher=John Wiley and Sons|year=2009|isbn=978-1-4051-9833-2|access-date=24 January 2015|archive-date=23 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200523031336/https://books.google.com/books?id=59c6PSa5JCAC|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Laiou |first=Angeliki E. |author-link=Angeliki Laiou |title=The Economic History of Byzantium (Volume 1) |pages=130–131 |year=2002 |location=Washington, DC |publisher=Dumbarton Oaks |editor=Angeliki E. Laiou |chapter=Writing the Economic History of Byzantium |chapter-url=http://www.doaks.org/publications/doaks_online_publications/EHB.html |access-date=6 June 2012 |archive-date=18 February 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120218231151/http://www.doaks.org/publications/doaks_online_publications/EHB.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> The [[Ottoman Empire]] gradually gained [[List of cities conquered by the Ottoman Empire|control over many cities]] in the Mediterranean area, including [[Fall of Constantinople|Constantinople in 1453]].

In the [[Holy Roman Empire]], beginning in the 12th century, [[free imperial city|free imperial cities]] such as [[Nuremberg]], [[Strasbourg]], [[Frankfurt]], [[Basel]], [[Zürich]], and [[Nijmegen]] became a privileged elite among towns having won self-governance from their local lord or having been granted self-governance by the emperor and being placed under his immediate protection. By 1480, these cities, as far as still part of the empire, became part of the [[Imperial Estates]] governing the empire with the emperor through the [[Imperial Diet (Holy Roman Empire)|Imperial Diet]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/free-and-imperial-cities|title=Free and Imperial Cities – Dictionary definition of Free and Imperial Cities|website=encyclopedia.com|access-date=29 May 2018|archive-date=29 May 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180529203824/https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/free-and-imperial-cities|url-status=live}}</ref>

By the 13th and 14th centuries, some cities had become powerful states, taking surrounding areas under their control or establishing extensive maritime empires. In Italy, [[medieval commune]]s developed into [[Italian city-states|city-states]] including the [[Republic of Venice]] and the [[Republic of Genoa]]. In Northern Europe, cities including [[Lübeck]] and [[Bruges]] formed the [[Hanseatic League]] for collective defense and commerce. Their power was later [[Dutch–Hanseatic War|challenged]] and eclipsed by the [[Burgundian Netherlands|Dutch]] commercial [[History of urban centers in the Low Countries|cities]] of [[Ghent]], [[Ypres]], and [[Amsterdam]].<ref>Kaplan et al. (2004), pp. 47–50.</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Parker |first1=Geoffrey |title=Sovereign City: The City-state Through History |date=2004 |publisher=Reaktion Books |location=London |isbn=9781861892195}}</ref> Similar phenomena existed elsewhere, as in the case of [[Sakai, Osaka|Sakai]], which enjoyed considerable autonomy in late medieval Japan.

In the first millennium AD, the [[Khmer Empire|Khmer]] capital of [[Angkor]] in Cambodia grew into the most extensive [[Pre-industrial society|preindustrial settlement]] in the world by area,<ref name="Evans PNAS">Evans ''et al.'', [http://www.pnas.org/content/104/36/14277 A comprehensive archaeological map of the world's largest preindustrial settlement complex at Angkor, Cambodia] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170422171845/http://www.pnas.org/content/104/36/14277 |date=22 April 2017 }}, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the US, 23 August 2007.</ref><ref name="BBC News 2007">"[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6945574.stm Map reveals ancient urban sprawl] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071028014349/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6945574.stm |date=28 October 2007 }}", BBC News, 14 August 2007.</ref> covering over {{Convert|1000|km2|abbr=on}} and possibly supporting up to one million people.<ref name="Evans PNAS" /><ref>[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/metropolis-angkor-the-worlds-first-megacity-461623.html Metropolis: Angkor, the world's first mega-city] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110919133524/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/metropolis-angkor-the-worlds-first-megacity-461623.html |date=19 September 2011}}, The Independent, 15 August 2007</ref>

[[West Africa]] already had cities before the [[Common Era]], but the consolidation of [[Trans-Saharan trade]] in the Middle Ages multiplied the number of cities in the region, as well as making some of them very populous, notably [[Gao]] (72,000 inhabitants in 800 AD), [[Old Oyo|Oyo-Ile]] (50,000 inhabitants in 1400 AD, and may have reached up to 140,000 inhabitants in the 18th century), [[Ifẹ̀|Ile-Ifẹ̀]] (70,000 to 105,000 inhabitants in the 14th and 15th centuries), [[Niani, Guinea|Niani]] (50,000 inhabitants in 1400 AD) and [[Timbuktu]] (100,000 inhabitants in 1450 AD).<ref name="Monroe, J. Cameron 2017" /><ref>''[https://www.african-cities.org/african-cities-from-500-ad-to-1900/ African cities from 500 AD to 1900] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220217094302/https://www.african-cities.org/african-cities-from-500-ad-to-1900/ |date=17 February 2022 }}'' By David Satterthwaite. 2021.</ref>