Metropolis

A metropolis is a word that means a very big city,^[1] that usually has over 500,000 people living in it.^[2] A metropolis often has many smaller towns and cities inside its area.

The word began in ancient Greece,^[1] from the words for "mother" and "city". It meant the city-state of origin of a colony. Later it came to mean the seat of a Bishop who also supervised the Church in other cities, or a city regarded as a center of some specified activity, or a large and important city. In India a "metropolis" is a city with more than a million people.

In the past many large cities were called metropolitan due to their size or importance; such as: Alexandria, Angkor, Antioch, Athens, Babylon, Baghdad, Beirut, Benares, Byblos, Carthage, Constantinople, Corinth, Damascus, Ephesus, Great Zimbabwe, Harappa, Jerusalem, Kangla, Nanjing, Nineveh, Macchu Picchu, Mohenjo-Daro, Rome, Sarai, Side, Syracuse, Tenochtitlan, Teotihuacan, Tikal, Tyre, Xian and Ur.

The modern metropolises are increasing day by day in this world since pre-21st century.

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1} United Nations, "Population density and urbanization"; compare Werner Staub and Dirk Krischenowki. "GeoTLDs – Diversity, Multilingualism and Local Content," Archived 2012-02-26 at the Wayback Machine Internet Governance Forum, Oct 30 – Nov 2, 2006, p. 31 n4; excerpt, "The United Nations has set up its own classifications scheme: a "big city" is a locality with 500,000 or more inhabitants; a "city" is a locality with 100,000 or more inhabitants; an "urban locality" is a locality with 20,000 or more inhabitants; a "rural locality" is a locality with less than 20,000 inhabitants ..."; retrieved 2013-4-24
2. ↑ Metropolis Association A full member is either a capital city or a city with more than one million inhabitants, City Mayors: Metropolis World Congress. Retrieved 15 July 2006.