Cities and their hinterlands Urban-rural interactions

Definitions Hinterland can refer to the rural area economically tied to the urban catchment of large cities or agglomerations The city can be considered as a nexus of social and political relationships that forms the heart of larger social and political networks City-states with a city and dependent territories, considerable part of the population living in the city for greater protection Territorial states with multiple centers inhabited by a smaller part of the population and a large part of the population living in the countryside

The Old World Hittites Syro-Hittites

Diyala hinterland Mesopotamia’s heartland

Cities and their harbors

City-states of Sumer Syro-Hittite city-states Greek city-states

Southern Mesopotamian delta plain

River levees

Robert McCormick Adams Land Behind Baghdad. A History of Settlement on the Diyala Plain (1965) The Evolution of Urban Society: Early Mesopotamia and Prehispanic Mexico (1966) The Uruk Countryside. The Natural Setting of Urban Societies (1972, with H.J.Nissen) Heartland of Cities. Surveys of Ancient Settlement and Land Use on the Central Floodplain of the Euphrates (1981)

Tells

Western highland Mesoamerica Eastern lowland Mesoamerica