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10.4: Urban Revival in Europe

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    Urban Revival in Europe

    From the 11th century onward, a more extensive money economy developed. The emerging regional specializations and trading patterns provided the foundations for a new phase of urbanization based on merchant capitalism. By 1400, long distance trading was well established based not only on luxury goods but also on metals, timber, and a variety of agricultural goods. At that time, Europe had about 3000 cities, most of them very small. Paris, with about 275,000 people, was the dominant European city. Besides Constantinople (Byzantium) and Cordoba (Spain), only cities from northern Italy (Milan, Florence), and Bruges (Belgium) had more than 50,000 inhabitants.

    Between the 14th and 18th centuries, fundamental changes occurred that transformed not only the cities and urban systems of Europe but also the entire world economy. Merchant capitalism increased in scale and the Protestant Reformation and scientific revolution of the Renaissance stimulated economic and social reorganization. Overseas colonization allowed Europeans to shape the world’s economies and societies. Spanish and Portuguese colonists were the first to extend the European urban system to the world’s peripheral regions. Between 1520 and 1580 Spanish colonists established the basis of a Latin American urban system. Centralization of political power and the formation of national states during the Renaissance determined the development of more integrated national urban systems.


    10.4: Urban Revival in Europe is shared under a CC BY-NC 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

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