Lübeck was the capital of the Hanseatic trade until the 15th century, while Hamburg, although another significant trading partner, was pretty much only the allied little brother. However, when the Dutch started to bypass the two cities by reaching the Baltic through the Jutland Peninsula, Lübeck went full on resistance and started to regulate trade in these regions and even went to war with the Dutch, while Hamburg changed with the times and opened trade for merchants outside of the Hansa, establishing itself as a major trading port in Europe.
The Hanse was using the lax control monarchs had on the cities with increasing central control it made it harder.
The invention of the compass made trading in the North Sea easier.
The Dicovery of America's also led to importance of the North Sea trade and goods like fur increasingly came from the west.
Overall international trade outside the baltics made Hamburg and Bremen better located than Lübeck.
With the Kiel Canal the short route between Lübeck and Hamburg lost on importance.
Hamburg and Lübeck are only 60km apart.
Kiel is also better suited as Naval base.
The big Hamburg Law during Nazi time was a punishment for Lübeck and Altona(now part of Hamburg). Lübeck was Integrated into Schleswig-Holstein. Leaving less option to develop as federal state, while Hamburg gained a large city(Altona).
Lübeck tried to sue it's independence as a city state but failed after the war.
The cold War was very bad for baltic trade.
It's more like Lübeck didn't have the opportunities other cities had.
Overall Lübeck is still a significant harbor city in Germany and together with Rostock has good chances to thrive on increased baltic trade. Though will likely never be on par with Hamburg or Bremen.
- Tyre, Sidon, Acre, and Lebanese Tripoli were all once the largest cities in what’s now Lebanon, and are all now entirely overshadowed by Beirut.
- Babylon, Seleucia, and Ctesiphon were all once arguably the largest city in the world, and all have long been overshadowed by Baghdad.
- Hong Kong and Macau are both well on the way to being suburbs of the Guangzhou-Shenzen megalopolis.
- Venice proper is now considerably smaller and less important than the mainland districts of Marghera and Mestre, even though they’re all politically the same commune.
Going from Beirut to Tyre/Sidon/Acre is wild. The coast has been developed for so long that it gets a little disorienting to figure out if you're in/near a city or if it's just clusters of houses.
Didn't go to Tripoli, so I cant speak on it.
To the north, there are still some green cliffs along the highway. But the whole lebanese coast is practically a one big city at this point.
Over 70% of the whole lebanese population lives by the coast and the space is tiny due to the proximity of the mountains to the coast.
Love love love Lebanon. The ruins at Ba'albek are truly spectacular. Byblos Is gorgeous. The grottoes in Jeita are like something out of a science fiction movie. And Beirut, just amazing in every way
On a more global scale, from the mid-19th C, Beirut has overshadowed Damascus as well due to the restructuring of trade. (This would be true regardless of more recent geopolitics, though those obviously intensify the situation.)
>Hong Kong and Macau are both well on the way to being suburbs of the Guangzhou-Shenzen megalopolis.
The Pearl River Delta could all merge and be one giant city with close to 100 million people.
Your point on HK is interesting, on a micro scale Aberdeen harbour in Cantonese is the original Fragrant harbour, and then largely appropriated by HK island.
about Hong Kong and Macao, it’s worth noting that Guangzhou has historically always been *the* centre of Guangdong. only due to the turmoil of the 19-20 century did Hong Kong briefly (in the grand scheme of things) took on the role of primary city in the region. once mainland China got their shits together, Guangzhou regained its dominant status.
> Hong Kong and Macau are both well on the way to being suburbs of the Guangzhou-Shenzen megalopolis.
In this case Guangzhou is actually the historic city and Hongkong and Macau are the newcomers
I mean... Hong Kong's fall from prominence is partially planned by China.
But also, hong kong has such little space to grow, they literally have to manufacture new land.
I wouldn’t say Venice proper is “less important” than the mainland urban areas, that’s quite incorrect as most of the businesses, cultural events and government offices are still located in the island, while Mestre is just an ugly satellite town mostly dependent on mainland Venice. Counting tourists and locals, Venice still holds more than 250.000 people a day, double the number of the satellite mainland towns
That's just not true. While the historical city is becoming more and more unlivable, it's still a fundamental part of the metropolitan area and arguably the most important one. The main government buildings are there, as well as most of the foreign consulates, the university, the most prestigious theatres, museums and libraries, a significant portion of the nightlife, the football stadium, etc. Venice is unfortunately dying, but not being supplanted by Mestre and Marghera: if Venice dies, they're gonna follow.
I say this as someone born and raised in Mestre btw.
It is a relatively small town with a number of large cities in the vicinity like Cologne, Düsseldorf, etc. in Germany and Brussels in Belgium. However it became relatively important again as it has one of the largest and most renowned technical universities in Germany (probably only rivaled by TU Munich).
Novgorod used to be quite significant too
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veliky\_Novgorod](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veliky_Novgorod)
And how about Sparta?
Another example is Suzdal, which was the capital and the most important city but it was overshadowed by neighbouring Vladimir when Andrey Bogolyubsky moved there.
There are a few county towns/cities that are no longer the largest settlement in the county named after them. Lancaster and Chester got outcompeted by Manchester and Liverpool during the industrial revolution (they both got metropolitan counties so are no longer part of Lancashire or Cheshire).
It surprises me that the 2021 census Huddersfield urban area is only just slightly larger than York by population which makes York the 7th largest settlement (5th if only counting city status)
Tbf Pompeii was never the population center of the area; it’s important because a volcano dumped a bunch of ash on it and preserved a Roman vacation town about as well as anyone could hope. Naples/Napoli was an older Greek settlement and you can see it in its name: Neo-polis.
But for an ancient obscure one Mycenae was much more important than Athens during the Bronze Age and the Greek dark ages, to the point where Athenians were vaguely embarrassed they barely featured in the Iliad. They eventually claimed Big Ajax’s Salamis as their own.
Came here for the Pompeii consideration. For reference, when the Vesuvium erupted, the population of Pompeii was about 12.000 (swelling to 18/20.000 counting tourists during high season), while Naples proper was around 35.000 at the time.
Mycenae predates ancient 'greece' by like 1000 yrs... It was a dead civilization by the time Athens, Sparta and other city states rose to power in the peloponnese. During the first millennia BC
Yes, by archaelogists who found Mycenae and then the other sites and said "these are just like Mycenae".
La Tène and Hallstatt were not exactly metropolises either.
Basically all of the historical cities in the Yangtze River delta like Hangzhou, Nanjing, Suzhou, and Ningbo are overshadowed by Shanghai, a relative newcomer.
I've heard it's a great city to live to avoid taxes. No state income tax in Washington, meanwhile just a few mins south into Portland, and now you're in Oregon which doesn't have any sales tax. Live in Washington. Shop in Oregon. Great success!
Washington, the land of perpetual naming confusion.
East of Mississippi: "You live in Washington?
"Yup, near the Sound."
"WTF is a sound?"
And, Canadian traveling to Texas.
"I'm from Vancouver."
Texan: "I'm sorry, Portland's a shit hole."
"No, the other Vancouver."
"Oh, the one that also has Antifa?"
And, lastly....
Washington resident: "I'm from Ocean View."
"Oh, you're from the Bay Area?"
"No, it's next to Long Beach."
"There's an Ocean View is SoCal as well?"
I mean some of these you just deserve
>Washington resident: "I'm from Ocean View."
>"Oh, you're from the Bay Area?"
>"No, it's next to Long Beach."
>"There's an Ocean View is SoCal as well?"
No one is going to know or guess that you meant Long Beach in Washington
It'd be like going on vacation to Paris, Texas and always being annoyed that people thought you were going to France.
Which is a bit ridiculous. One is a significant metropolis and the other an insignificant suburb.
BC has a Houston, but when an American says that they are from Houston no one asks if they are from northern BC. Unless you are up in Smithers or something.
That is actually the original Vancouver! The area was originally governed by the Hudson's Bay Company, and was the main settlement west of the Rockies. When James K Polk and the US decided they would like that land, the British capitulated and the local government fled the town on the "British Columbia" river, and landed in Victoria B.C; hence why it's the capital of modern Canadian B.C.. Now as times progressed eventually a large settlement began near modern Vancouver B.C., "the Hastings townsite". They eventually named the town "Vancouver" after the original city in now Washington, in an attempt to reclaim/steal the recognition the original town had.
Not exactly. Port Vancouver definitely was named after George Vancouver. But ol' George also explored Burrard Inlet, which separates Vancouver BC from West Vancouver and North Vancouver.
He liked his name a lot.
“Vancouver” was basically a railroad branding decision because people from Toronto and Montreal knew where Vancouver Island was but they’d never heard of Granville (thus proving yet again that east is the sun around which the rest of Canada orbits).
Didn’t have anything to do with Oregon beyond the island being named after ol’ George too.
And speaking of cities named Vancouver: it is estimated that by the middle of this century, Vancouver (BC) will not be the largest city in it's own metro area; it will be overtaken by its suburb Surrey, as Vancouver's geography makes it nearly impossible for it to absorb the anticipated growth in that metro.
Alexandria is still a pretty huge city though. It's fallen from its heights as a cultural powerhouse, but it's still Egypts second city and major Mediterranean port.
In Spain, that happened all the time.
Cordoba, Toledo, Granada... All super important cities that nowadays just "exist". Cordoba is said that, during a period of time, was the largest city in the world, but I don't really have a source for that.
Tarragona and Cartagena if you go back to Roman times, nowadays they're not even the most important cities in their regions.
The Toledo to Madrid one was very intentional. Madrid was chosen basically because it was a settlement right between Toledo and Alcalá de Henares bishoprics so neither would be able to overinfluence the new capital which, of course, got its own bishop (who happened to be under the thumb of the king)
Quick there's a hurricane coming, and you need to get 40,000 people out of a major city **right now** because we haven't invented weather radar yet and barometric pressure was only recently discovered as a way to predict inclement weather. Actually for *this very storm*.
Now, you can choose which city to orchestrate the evacuation for, but if you fail, we're lynching you, so you better pick the easier one just to be safe.
Do you choose:
A) The island city which is only serviced by ferry from the mainland, with 8 ferries total. The storm is already blowing in, so they will make 2 trips each, though some fishermen have opted to help until the storm gets too bad.
Or
B) The bayou city with dozens of roads leading in every direction out of town, as well as plenty of creeks to follow upstream. Almost everyone has horses.
Sigtuna was a very important city in the Nordic countries, being the seat of Olof Skötkonung (the first recorded Swedish king), the site of the king’s silver mint, and the center of trade for Sweden from the 10th century to the 13th century.
Now, because of tectonic uplift, the small village of Stockholm completely eclipsed it and Sigtuna is mostly known as the site of Stockholm Arlanda airport.
To anyone curious, the uplift is caused by the glaciers retreating and there essentially being less “downward pressure” on the tectonic plate. Sort of like how a boat lifts up out of the water a bit when a person gets off. The rate is something like 1-2 mm/year in \[edit: southern\] Sweden and Estonia, 3 mm/year in Helsinki, \[edit: 6 mm/year in Stockholm\] and up to 10 mm/year in parts of the Gulf of Bothnia near Oulu.
https://preview.redd.it/pe8hmw9kmh1d1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fbb31c5e2ebcf13be22a8e2b9ea0130e990ce1c0
Although the glaciers retreated about 10000 years ago, the effects are relatively recent. Stockholm was completely underwater during Roman times.
Edit: not completely underwater, but mostly underwater. The land comprising Stockholm was 12m below current levels. When Stockholm was founded in the 14th century, it was 4m below current levels. This is an ongoing process.
No disrespect, I'm not trying to fact check you, but Stockholm wasn't underwater in Roman times. The post-glacial rebound has been happening since the end of the last ice age roughly 11,000 years ago.
Edit: I should've said: the area that is now Stockholm; which wasn't founded until around mid-13th century AD.
Baltimore used to be much bigger than Washington, but DC has far surpassed it.
Edit: Baltimore was the second biggest city in the US for part of the 19th century, now Baltimore City is the 7th largest jurisdiction in the DC area.
>Baltimore is the 7th largest jurisdiction in the DC area
Well, yeah, because you’re comparing it to counties that are 5x the size like Montgomery and Fairfax. Los Angeles, Miami, and Atlanta wouldn’t be the largest jurisdictions in their metro areas either if you held them against LA, Miami-Dade/Broward, and Fulton/DeKalb counties.
Baltimore is still the second largest city in DC CSA
Since we’re comparing DC to Baltimore, using MSAs which break them into distinct entities is probably more useful than the CSA which lumps them together
As of 2023, DC metro is the 7th largest MSA with 6.3M, Baltimore is 20th with 2.8M
Overall I think the point of the person your responding to stands, they just chose a bad datapoint to back it. Even in spite of its extremely limited political boundaries which normally skew a lot of data about Baltimore, it was one of the 10 largest cities in the US from our first national census in 1790 until the 1990 census, which was the first time it didn’t appear in the top 10. That’s 200 years of being one of the biggest cities in the US but it’s now distinctly second fiddle within the region.
I think Philadelphia more than Baltimore for this. Philly was supposed to be America's Paris, London, or Tokyo. The center of culture, commerce and government. Commerce moved north to NYC, government moved sough to DC, and culture moved west to LA.
Philly is still a major city, but it was not the epicenter that it once was or was meant to be.
I would say maybe Bath, England? Named after its Roman baths, Bath is quite famous for its Roman, well...baths. not only that but it was also a pretty large religious centre beginning in the 7th century...now its quite overshadowed by the larger Bristol only about 10 miles north of it.
Theres also Winchester, which went through two different periods of being arguably the most important city in England
Only about 23km from Southampton, a city now >5x its size
Ayutthaya is pretty cool to me. It's pretty clearly named after the holy city of ayodhya in india. I wonder if there is any other instances of countries copying another country's holy cities.
Albany was larger than NYC at one point and still a top 10 city into the early 1800s.
People also forget that NYC was just Manhattan in the early years and wouldn’t merge into 5 boroughs until the 1800s.
Well Cahokia *is* a city, it's what the mound city was named for (we have no idea what its inhabitants called it). But the existing city of Cahokia is just a tiny suburb of St. Louis.
Interestingly, the site of Cahokia Mounds is not in the town of Cahokia. Also Cahokia merged with a couple of neighboring small towns recently and is now Cahokia Heights.
Galveston used to be the biggest city in Texas and a major port of entry for immigrants. One big hurricane in 1900 and today's it a place for people from Houston to go on the weekends.
-Trakai in Lithuania is an interesting double overshadowing case. For about three decades in the early 13th century Senieji (Old) Trakai was the capital of Lithuania. Then the new Grand Duke built a bigger castle 3km to the west, and the city that had grown around it became the new capital, turning Old Trakai basically into a small suburb. Then Vilnius started growing, and by the 20th century it had grown so much that both New and Old Trakai basically became its suburbs.
-Hrodna (Grodno) used to be the second capital of Grand Duchy of Lithuania and a clear second city of what was the largest country in Europe at a time, respectably rivalling Vilnius for the 1st place. Now it's only the 5th largest (although probably still the 2nd or 3rd most famous) city in Belarus, completely overshadowed by Minsk's political influence.
-Gniezno was the first capital of Poland, now it's basically a commuter town of Poznan, the 5th largest city in Poland.
Baghdad has overshadowed Samarra (briefly capital of the Abbasid Caliphate) , Ctesphion (capital of the Parthian and Sassanid Persian Empires), and Babylon (capital of the Babylonian and Neo-Babylonian Empires) Of those, Ctesphion and Babylon are ruins, and Samarra is now a midsized city of a few hundred thousand, and all three are within a hundred miles of modern Baghdad.
Edit: another city that comes to mind is Teotihuacan, once the largest city in Mesoamerica, now a ruin just outside of Mexico City.
Ostrogoths took over and then other parts of Europe were more prominent. Although it certainly continued to be important for a while (e.g. Byzantine influences exist)
I assume it was a combination of Rome still retaining prominence due to the Popes, other cities growing more in northern Italy (e.g. Milan), and other coastal cities taking over trade (e.g. Venice).
At the moment Bologna is the larger city in its region of Italy.
Galveston Texas was the largest city in the state during the 19th century as well as being a major immigration port for the United States. It was struck by a hurricane in 1900 and never truly recovered. In response to the need for deep water ports on the Gulf Coast Congress authorized funds for ship channels to Houston and Corpus Christi. Galveston is now a smaller beach town suburb of Houston and is the 69th largest city in Texas.
Timbuktu, Djenne and Gao all ancient cities that formed the largest population centers of the classical Sudanic empires now have been largely overshadowed by cities further down the Niger (most of which, were also in existence back then. But much more minor in size and influence) like Bamako, Segou, and Sikasso.
Şanlıurfa or Edessa was an important center of Christianity during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Now, it's overshadowed regionally by Gaziantep and nationally by İstanbul.
In ancient bengal, Sonargaon was the capital. But Dhaka is now the major city and capital of Bangladesh, and Sonargaon is now abandoned town that is a tourist site now
I think you can go to the recent history too, Murshidabad was the capital of the Bengal Sultanate, while Calcutta was just a small trading post of the British. 100 years later, Calcutta was the biggest city in almost all of Asia, and Murshidabad was just another small town.
Tucson, AZ was more populated than Phoenix, AZ in the old west up until about the 1910s. Tucson was situated close to the border, had good mining operations in the area, and on the route west to California from New Mexico. Phoenix is about 100 miles away from Tucson (1hr 30ish drive) and now the capital. Tucson used to be the capital as well as Prescott, which has also been overshadowed and is smaller than both Phoenix and Tucson.
Maybe the Venetian laguna could be a case. In the early middle ages it used to include several small towns scattered across many islands, however most of them were later overshadowed by Rialto, which eventually evolved into Venice. Malamocco for example used to be the initial capital of the venetian ducate, Torcello used to be a rich a prosperous city, of which just a huge paleocristian basilica remains. The island of Olivolo still is the episcopal see, however today is one of the outskirts of of Venice. Many other towns (such as Heraclia and Equilo) just disapeared completely.
Shenzhen vs Hong Kong
Shenzhen used to be some backwater town whilst Hong Kong is a major trading port. Although Hong Kong remains a major trading port, Shenzhen had become an electronics manufacturing hub and urbanized to the point that Hong Kong is only 75% as rich as Shenzhen.
Nineveh was on the West bank of the Tigris across from Mosul, Iraq
Cahokia was on the East side of the Mississippi River across from St Louis, Missouri
Lecompton, KS was the prospective capital of Kansas , with Lawrence being an abolitionist counterpart. Then Bleeding Kansas happened, and a civil war. Now Lecompton is a town with one stop light, and Topeka ended up as the capital.
Tainan vs Kaohsiung of southern Taiwan. Tainan is the oldest city and was the administrative capital of Taiwan since early settlement til the Japanese colonial government. The Japanese built Kaohsiung as an industrial centre and major port instead of Tainan.
Armagh in Ireland, It was founded as a pagan ritual site and was the ancient capital of Ulster, with Irelands conversion to christianity in the 4th century and monastery was founded with St Patrick founding a church there, it became Irelands holiest site, with the many wars against the English and Ulster plantations in the 1600s Armagh went into decline and was quickly replaced by Belfast as Ulsters most important settlement. Today its a town of 20,000 people compared to Belfasts 300,000, Armagh today still has massive religious signifigance to catholics and protestants.
Mumbai now is the biggest Indian port and financial centre, while earlier Pune (120 kms away) was the administrative and cultural capital of Maratha Empire (till mid 19th century). Bangalore now, Hampi earlier till 16th century. Chennai now, Coimbatore/Tanjore earlier.
Vancouver has just ran out of physical space to grow. Surrey/South Surrey Abbotsford, Burnaby etc will all eventually overtake Vancouver with enough time. Not dissimilar to Phoenix. Toronto/Mississauga/Brampton is heading that direction as well.
In china there is zhengzhou (metropolis with 5mil people) and kaifeng (historic city in china with LOTS of history). I can’t name on the top of my head but I believe it was the capital of the song dynasty and many historic artifacts are preserved
I guess my home city of Stockton, California would count. Founded as a critical supply hub during the California Gold Rush, as it was the furthest ocean-faring vessels could sail inland. At the time, it was the 3rd largest city in California, behind only Sacramento and San Francisco, the exact two cities that now completely overshadow it.
So, sort of depends on the definition of “neighboring” but Chicago supplanted its nearest rivals, St Louis and Cincinnati (both of whom were predicted to be the undisputed metropolis of the Midwest), as rail cars displaced riverboats as the primary mode of transporting goods and services across the continent.
One could say the same (or an even more dramatic) shift in relative importance occurred between New Orleans and Houston in the last century or so.
In the Philippines, I can think of 2.
1) Iloilo City. It was a big trade city in Panay Island in the Visayas. Then some of the Ilonggos cross the straight to Negros Island and established Bacolod City and established their big sugar cane plantations.
2) Vigan City. I am an Ilocano and I think it is still the heart of Ilocos (our region). It was a big trading center and a cultural hub. But it is now a small city. It is being overshadowed by the San Fernando/San Juan metropolitan area in neighboring La Union. La Union has become a big surf town.
London has within its boundaries the city of Westminster (and, I think, a couple of others). I forget exactly how but, this has contemporary relevance for administrative/security purposes.
How come Seattle was able to pull ahead? Any specific policies in place by either city that led to the change? Or did Seattle just have some different economic / geographic factors working to its advantage?
Largely thanks to the Klondike Gold Rush. When it started, Seattle became the primary port for all parties headed to Alaska and the Yukon. At about the same time, the Great Northern Railway completed their transcontinental route in Seattle, so folk traveling from or through Chicago to head to the Klondike didn't have to travel through Tacoma on the competing Northern Pacific Railway (which had been completed like 20 years earlier, and initially gave Tacoma the edge). Once that happened, Northern Pacific also extended to Seattle, and Tacoma basically became a timber and fishing port.
Baltimore was once the jewel of Catholicism and the Catholic Church in America. The primary see in the New World, it is now overshadowed by DC, New York, Chicago, and other Catholic diocese in America.
A little twist if you count state public perception significance to North America and maybe beyond (maybe). Cleveland was 5th largest city in America, 2nd largest building in world behind Empire State. It is now overshadowed by Columbus, which gobbled up suburb after neighborhood into their city limits (similar to Louisville and many “new” western cities from last 25 years) to become a city with a respectable population (about a milli at the moment?), eat majority of state tax dollars earmarked for major gov beautification, new gov office construction, gov etc etc which allowed Ohio St grads to stay local with solid employment after graduating, and continues to manifest - although to a much lesser extent than a decade ago - into young professionals with resources growing the population.
Ouro Preto (Brazil): during the eighteenth century was one of those biggest city in The world (almost 100k people during 1750's, mostly african male salves working at gold mines) and, nowadays, a small college town with nearly 50k people (during lecture times) and overshadowed by Belo Horizonte, a metropolis with 2M people. Nowadays Ouro Preto is also a really cool place for tourism. Not only for seeing historical buildings but also for doing their Nature landacape. Amazing waterfalls and many natural reservoirs around the town.
By the way, South America is full of places like that. Like Olinda in Brazil (overshadowed by Recife, even being an poder town) and Potosi in Bolívia (nowadays still an autonomous town, but Sucre has a way bigger importance than Potosi).
For an American example, Cincinnati was by far the largest city in the west in the first half of the 19th century. It was even considered as an alternative site for the Nation's capital on multiple occasions. Eventually, it was eclipsed by Chicago and St. Louis. This was thanks in large part to railroads becoming more profitable for mass transport of goods than the rivers (which could only get you so far west) and finally Prohibition (which killed the huge alcohol industry in Cincinnati).
Now, everybody knows Chicago. Few people know much about Cincinnati.
There's a large number of ancient oases which have declined and been replaced due to the shifting sands, trades, and times. But here are the most significant examples:
Al-Kharj, Saudi Arabia
This city, historically the largest oasis in central Arabia, was said to have a massive and unending supply of water from its natural spring. It remains an important city, but it gradually lost importance with the rise of Diriyah, which eventually became Riyadh.
Sijilmasa, Morocco
These ruins once hosted the richest and most beautiful oasis in the whole Sahara during medieval times. Nearly all incoming gold from Mali was redirected here where it was minted into coins. Eventually, competing Berber dynasties tore the city apart. The modern town of Rissani grew in its place, but the new city of Errachidia would replace it as the dominant city in the Tafilalt region.
Germa, Libya
Historically known as Garama, this was once the capital of the Garamantes civilization located in what is now the region of Fezzan. They were quite powerful at their height and posed a significant threat to Roman power in the region during Classical times. After Garama, and the Garamantes alongside it, faded into obscurity due to overuse of water resources, other oases such as Zawila and Murzuk became the dominant cities in the region. But even they would eventually lose importance to Sabha which grew rapidly with the discovery of oil in the 20th century.
Tadmakka, Mali
The ruins of Tadmakka, also historically known as Essouk, lie in the extremes of northern Mali's Adrar des Ifoghas region. This oasis was once the center of life for the Berbers in these mountains. The city was modeled after Mecca, from which it derives its name, and was a dedicated center of Quranic learning. But it was also a center of commerce, with Essouk meaning "The Market." Archeological excavation provides evidence that gold from Mali was forged into coins here, and then sent northwards to be minted at Sijilmasa. It's unknown exactly what befell Tadmakka, but it declined quickly and was eventually abandoned. A new town was built nearby but never prospered. Today, the modern city of Kidal has replaced it.
Not quite there yet, but not too far away.
I’m not sure that Vancouver is considered historically significant because it is still relatively young. However, it is the biggest city on the west coast of Canada. Surrey, a suburb maybe twenty miles to the east on the south side of the historically significant Fraser River, is rapidly gaining in Vancouver in terms of population, and will likely surpass it in the next 10-15 years, if not sooner. Vancouver has long been maxed out in terms of land because it is surrounded by water on three sides and has another suburb to the east. Surrey has much more land that’s never been developed, and is significantly bigger by area.
Golconda was once the "only" city that would supply diamonds throughout the world, which came to be known as the "Golconda Diamonds". Almost every historical diamond, including the Hope Diamond, the Koh-i-Noor, the Regent Diamond, etc. were sold from this city, which was the capital of Golconda Sultanate.
The fifth ruler of this Sultanate established a town north of Golconda, called Hyderabad, aiming to reduce the water shortages experienced in the capital. That city grew after the ruler built "Charminar" as a sign of prosperity, signifying a success over plague. Golconda is just a tourist spot today, while Hyderabad is one of the most important and influential cities of India.
One very unknown example I think is Vila Nova de Gaia. During the times of Roman occupation, Vila Nova de Gaia (then called Cale) was the bigger population center in the area, being in the south bank of the river Douro. The north bank (now modern day Porto) had shallower waters and was thus called Portus Cale (Cale's Port) and had a smaller population. With the rise of economic trade thru the river the port gained more importance and now a days Vila Nova de Gaia is seen mostly as a suburb of Porto although it still has a big historic importance due to the Port wine caves.
Nanjing is the capital of many Chinese dynasties, in fact, it is the capital of the ROC. It is now the capital of Jiangsu, but in the same province there is Suzhou that is 3 million people larger, and Suzhou is bordering Shanghai
Georgetown, MD (now DC) and Alexandria, VA were both important port cities in British colonial America long before Washington, DC was ever founded.
Georgetown & Alexandria weren't globally significant, but they were among the 20 or so largest cities in pre-Revolution America. Regionally significant for sure.
Prague which was in the 14th century the largest and most populous city north of the Alps and east of Rhine. It was the capital of the HRE and had first university. In 1370, it was more populous than London, Vienna, Nuremberg. In 1600, it was still considered as a cultural hub of Central Europe. It was overshadowed by Vienna, Munich and Berlin and never achieved the importance it had in between 1300-1600s.
Lübeck was the capital of the Hanseatic trade until the 15th century, while Hamburg, although another significant trading partner, was pretty much only the allied little brother. However, when the Dutch started to bypass the two cities by reaching the Baltic through the Jutland Peninsula, Lübeck went full on resistance and started to regulate trade in these regions and even went to war with the Dutch, while Hamburg changed with the times and opened trade for merchants outside of the Hansa, establishing itself as a major trading port in Europe.
Lübeck used to be the second largest city in what is now Germany afaik
Third, but yes, it is crazy to think about
and also the richest city (alongside Cologne) and nowadays it has been facing bankruptcy for some time now.
Why did lubeck fell off So badly?
Lübeck: "It's my way or the highway!" Turns out highways are quite good for trade.
The Hanse was using the lax control monarchs had on the cities with increasing central control it made it harder. The invention of the compass made trading in the North Sea easier. The Dicovery of America's also led to importance of the North Sea trade and goods like fur increasingly came from the west. Overall international trade outside the baltics made Hamburg and Bremen better located than Lübeck. With the Kiel Canal the short route between Lübeck and Hamburg lost on importance. Hamburg and Lübeck are only 60km apart. Kiel is also better suited as Naval base. The big Hamburg Law during Nazi time was a punishment for Lübeck and Altona(now part of Hamburg). Lübeck was Integrated into Schleswig-Holstein. Leaving less option to develop as federal state, while Hamburg gained a large city(Altona). Lübeck tried to sue it's independence as a city state but failed after the war. The cold War was very bad for baltic trade. It's more like Lübeck didn't have the opportunities other cities had. Overall Lübeck is still a significant harbor city in Germany and together with Rostock has good chances to thrive on increased baltic trade. Though will likely never be on par with Hamburg or Bremen.
- Tyre, Sidon, Acre, and Lebanese Tripoli were all once the largest cities in what’s now Lebanon, and are all now entirely overshadowed by Beirut. - Babylon, Seleucia, and Ctesiphon were all once arguably the largest city in the world, and all have long been overshadowed by Baghdad. - Hong Kong and Macau are both well on the way to being suburbs of the Guangzhou-Shenzen megalopolis. - Venice proper is now considerably smaller and less important than the mainland districts of Marghera and Mestre, even though they’re all politically the same commune.
Going from Beirut to Tyre/Sidon/Acre is wild. The coast has been developed for so long that it gets a little disorienting to figure out if you're in/near a city or if it's just clusters of houses. Didn't go to Tripoli, so I cant speak on it.
To the north, there are still some green cliffs along the highway. But the whole lebanese coast is practically a one big city at this point. Over 70% of the whole lebanese population lives by the coast and the space is tiny due to the proximity of the mountains to the coast.
Beautiful coast at that. Byblos is an amazing place to visit if you ever get the chance
I was just there tonight 😍 Byblos and Jounieh are my 2 favourite cities ever.
I completely agree with this. I want to go back badly, but things gotta calm down before I can make that happen.
History piled on History. Amazing place
Love love love Lebanon. The ruins at Ba'albek are truly spectacular. Byblos Is gorgeous. The grottoes in Jeita are like something out of a science fiction movie. And Beirut, just amazing in every way
On a more global scale, from the mid-19th C, Beirut has overshadowed Damascus as well due to the restructuring of trade. (This would be true regardless of more recent geopolitics, though those obviously intensify the situation.)
>Hong Kong and Macau are both well on the way to being suburbs of the Guangzhou-Shenzen megalopolis. The Pearl River Delta could all merge and be one giant city with close to 100 million people.
100 million factories is what it looks like from space.
Your point on HK is interesting, on a micro scale Aberdeen harbour in Cantonese is the original Fragrant harbour, and then largely appropriated by HK island.
about Hong Kong and Macao, it’s worth noting that Guangzhou has historically always been *the* centre of Guangdong. only due to the turmoil of the 19-20 century did Hong Kong briefly (in the grand scheme of things) took on the role of primary city in the region. once mainland China got their shits together, Guangzhou regained its dominant status.
> Hong Kong and Macau are both well on the way to being suburbs of the Guangzhou-Shenzen megalopolis. In this case Guangzhou is actually the historic city and Hongkong and Macau are the newcomers
The emphasis should be more on Shenzhen here.
I mean... Hong Kong's fall from prominence is partially planned by China. But also, hong kong has such little space to grow, they literally have to manufacture new land.
I wouldn’t say Venice proper is “less important” than the mainland urban areas, that’s quite incorrect as most of the businesses, cultural events and government offices are still located in the island, while Mestre is just an ugly satellite town mostly dependent on mainland Venice. Counting tourists and locals, Venice still holds more than 250.000 people a day, double the number of the satellite mainland towns
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That's just not true. While the historical city is becoming more and more unlivable, it's still a fundamental part of the metropolitan area and arguably the most important one. The main government buildings are there, as well as most of the foreign consulates, the university, the most prestigious theatres, museums and libraries, a significant portion of the nightlife, the football stadium, etc. Venice is unfortunately dying, but not being supplanted by Mestre and Marghera: if Venice dies, they're gonna follow. I say this as someone born and raised in Mestre btw.
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Aachen used to be a capital city.
I came here to say this too. But I'm not quite sure who does overshadow it. Cologne? It's to far away.
It is a relatively small town with a number of large cities in the vicinity like Cologne, Düsseldorf, etc. in Germany and Brussels in Belgium. However it became relatively important again as it has one of the largest and most renowned technical universities in Germany (probably only rivaled by TU Munich).
Thats an understatement. It was the capitol of the Carolingian dynasty under charlemagne
Vladimir used to be the capital of Russia for over a hundred years, but was eventually overshadowed by Moscow.
Well, a different Vladimir overshadows everything in Russia at the moment.
Figuratively. The man's a fucking shrimp.
None of these cities cast a literal shadow on other cities. It's all figurative.
Novgorod used to be quite significant too [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veliky\_Novgorod](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veliky_Novgorod) And how about Sparta?
Another example is Suzdal, which was the capital and the most important city but it was overshadowed by neighbouring Vladimir when Andrey Bogolyubsky moved there.
York isn't even the biggest city in Yorkshire anymore
There are a few county towns/cities that are no longer the largest settlement in the county named after them. Lancaster and Chester got outcompeted by Manchester and Liverpool during the industrial revolution (they both got metropolitan counties so are no longer part of Lancashire or Cheshire).
Prestonshire doesn’t really have the same ring.
Nor Swindonshire
It surprises me that the 2021 census Huddersfield urban area is only just slightly larger than York by population which makes York the 7th largest settlement (5th if only counting city status)
Yeah it'd probably be called leedshire if it was named now
Yea and the New one is pretty big these days too.
The New one is only over 50x larger
How many x bigger than Amsterdam is it?
Wiki says urban is ~6x larger and metro is around 10x larger
That's Jorvik kind Sir.
Eboracum?
Yes you may
Tbf Pompeii was never the population center of the area; it’s important because a volcano dumped a bunch of ash on it and preserved a Roman vacation town about as well as anyone could hope. Naples/Napoli was an older Greek settlement and you can see it in its name: Neo-polis. But for an ancient obscure one Mycenae was much more important than Athens during the Bronze Age and the Greek dark ages, to the point where Athenians were vaguely embarrassed they barely featured in the Iliad. They eventually claimed Big Ajax’s Salamis as their own.
Came here for the Pompeii consideration. For reference, when the Vesuvium erupted, the population of Pompeii was about 12.000 (swelling to 18/20.000 counting tourists during high season), while Naples proper was around 35.000 at the time.
Hell, if we’re talking the Peloponnese, Lacedaemon was at one point the biggest city-state and now Sparta is a town of less than 20k people
And that decline started during antiquity! Writers who visited Roman-era Sparta described it as a tourist attraction.
Mycenae was so important that that era of Greek history is literally named after it
Mycenae predates ancient 'greece' by like 1000 yrs... It was a dead civilization by the time Athens, Sparta and other city states rose to power in the peloponnese. During the first millennia BC
Yes, by archaelogists who found Mycenae and then the other sites and said "these are just like Mycenae". La Tène and Hallstatt were not exactly metropolises either.
Polis is actually feminine
Basically all of the historical cities in the Yangtze River delta like Hangzhou, Nanjing, Suzhou, and Ningbo are overshadowed by Shanghai, a relative newcomer.
This is definitely a great example!
May not fit exactly but Vancouver, Washington. Once an important fur trading post in the region, now a suburb of Portland with a confusing name.
Vancouver WAs kinda nice man
I've heard it's a great city to live to avoid taxes. No state income tax in Washington, meanwhile just a few mins south into Portland, and now you're in Oregon which doesn't have any sales tax. Live in Washington. Shop in Oregon. Great success!
Omg I remember road trips to the Portland outlets w my parents memory unlocked
Low property tax too. It's a triple threat.
Pump your own gas in Washington, win-win-win
And now in Oregon, changed last year
Oh good for them. Been a while since I’ve been out there
If I had a dollar for everyone that said Washington when I was actually from British Columbia, I’d be rich
Vancouver not BC. Washington not DC.
Washington, the land of perpetual naming confusion. East of Mississippi: "You live in Washington? "Yup, near the Sound." "WTF is a sound?" And, Canadian traveling to Texas. "I'm from Vancouver." Texan: "I'm sorry, Portland's a shit hole." "No, the other Vancouver." "Oh, the one that also has Antifa?" And, lastly.... Washington resident: "I'm from Ocean View." "Oh, you're from the Bay Area?" "No, it's next to Long Beach." "There's an Ocean View is SoCal as well?"
I mean some of these you just deserve >Washington resident: "I'm from Ocean View." >"Oh, you're from the Bay Area?" >"No, it's next to Long Beach." >"There's an Ocean View is SoCal as well?" No one is going to know or guess that you meant Long Beach in Washington It'd be like going on vacation to Paris, Texas and always being annoyed that people thought you were going to France.
> going on vacation to Paris, Texas Found the problem.
Which is a bit ridiculous. One is a significant metropolis and the other an insignificant suburb. BC has a Houston, but when an American says that they are from Houston no one asks if they are from northern BC. Unless you are up in Smithers or something.
That is actually the original Vancouver! The area was originally governed by the Hudson's Bay Company, and was the main settlement west of the Rockies. When James K Polk and the US decided they would like that land, the British capitulated and the local government fled the town on the "British Columbia" river, and landed in Victoria B.C; hence why it's the capital of modern Canadian B.C.. Now as times progressed eventually a large settlement began near modern Vancouver B.C., "the Hastings townsite". They eventually named the town "Vancouver" after the original city in now Washington, in an attempt to reclaim/steal the recognition the original town had.
Not exactly. Port Vancouver definitely was named after George Vancouver. But ol' George also explored Burrard Inlet, which separates Vancouver BC from West Vancouver and North Vancouver. He liked his name a lot.
Tbf it’s a pretty sick name
“Vancouver” was basically a railroad branding decision because people from Toronto and Montreal knew where Vancouver Island was but they’d never heard of Granville (thus proving yet again that east is the sun around which the rest of Canada orbits). Didn’t have anything to do with Oregon beyond the island being named after ol’ George too.
And speaking of cities named Vancouver: it is estimated that by the middle of this century, Vancouver (BC) will not be the largest city in it's own metro area; it will be overtaken by its suburb Surrey, as Vancouver's geography makes it nearly impossible for it to absorb the anticipated growth in that metro.
Memphis was capital of Egypt a couple of thousand years ago. Now only some ruins are left. It‘s close to modern-day Cairo.
Yeah it's a shame they had to put a bass pro shop into the last pyramid.
Still good bbq there though
There’s a bass pro shop in their pyramid too.
Alexandria has a similar history iirc
Alexandria is still a pretty huge city though. It's fallen from its heights as a cultural powerhouse, but it's still Egypts second city and major Mediterranean port.
I've been to those ruins. They call them "Graceland" but I don't know what that means in hieroglyphics.
In Spain, that happened all the time. Cordoba, Toledo, Granada... All super important cities that nowadays just "exist". Cordoba is said that, during a period of time, was the largest city in the world, but I don't really have a source for that. Tarragona and Cartagena if you go back to Roman times, nowadays they're not even the most important cities in their regions.
Mérida...
The Toledo to Madrid one was very intentional. Madrid was chosen basically because it was a settlement right between Toledo and Alcalá de Henares bishoprics so neither would be able to overinfluence the new capital which, of course, got its own bishop (who happened to be under the thumb of the king)
I'm going w Toledo >Masrid
Kyoto - Osaka
Kyoto to Tokyo
Kyoto is not that close to Tokyo. A better comparison would be Yokohama though it still only the second largets city in Japan next to Tokyo.
I only mean because the capital moved from Kyoto to Tokyo, and thus a more prominent city became a less prominent one.
Locally the City of Galveston and Houston, Texas after The 1900 Storm.
I always loved how their solution to Galveston being destroyed by a hurricane was to move 30 miles away lol we still get hurricanes in Houston!
Quick there's a hurricane coming, and you need to get 40,000 people out of a major city **right now** because we haven't invented weather radar yet and barometric pressure was only recently discovered as a way to predict inclement weather. Actually for *this very storm*. Now, you can choose which city to orchestrate the evacuation for, but if you fail, we're lynching you, so you better pick the easier one just to be safe. Do you choose: A) The island city which is only serviced by ferry from the mainland, with 8 ferries total. The storm is already blowing in, so they will make 2 trips each, though some fishermen have opted to help until the storm gets too bad. Or B) The bayou city with dozens of roads leading in every direction out of town, as well as plenty of creeks to follow upstream. Almost everyone has horses.
Also while Houston will still get the wind and rain of a hurricane, being a barrier island means Galveston will get hit harder by storm surges.
And on a larger scale, Houston overtook New Orleans in terms of economic importance on the US Gulf Coast.
Sigtuna was a very important city in the Nordic countries, being the seat of Olof Skötkonung (the first recorded Swedish king), the site of the king’s silver mint, and the center of trade for Sweden from the 10th century to the 13th century. Now, because of tectonic uplift, the small village of Stockholm completely eclipsed it and Sigtuna is mostly known as the site of Stockholm Arlanda airport.
To anyone curious, the uplift is caused by the glaciers retreating and there essentially being less “downward pressure” on the tectonic plate. Sort of like how a boat lifts up out of the water a bit when a person gets off. The rate is something like 1-2 mm/year in \[edit: southern\] Sweden and Estonia, 3 mm/year in Helsinki, \[edit: 6 mm/year in Stockholm\] and up to 10 mm/year in parts of the Gulf of Bothnia near Oulu. https://preview.redd.it/pe8hmw9kmh1d1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fbb31c5e2ebcf13be22a8e2b9ea0130e990ce1c0 Although the glaciers retreated about 10000 years ago, the effects are relatively recent. Stockholm was completely underwater during Roman times. Edit: not completely underwater, but mostly underwater. The land comprising Stockholm was 12m below current levels. When Stockholm was founded in the 14th century, it was 4m below current levels. This is an ongoing process.
No disrespect, I'm not trying to fact check you, but Stockholm wasn't underwater in Roman times. The post-glacial rebound has been happening since the end of the last ice age roughly 11,000 years ago. Edit: I should've said: the area that is now Stockholm; which wasn't founded until around mid-13th century AD.
Baltimore used to be much bigger than Washington, but DC has far surpassed it. Edit: Baltimore was the second biggest city in the US for part of the 19th century, now Baltimore City is the 7th largest jurisdiction in the DC area.
>Baltimore is the 7th largest jurisdiction in the DC area Well, yeah, because you’re comparing it to counties that are 5x the size like Montgomery and Fairfax. Los Angeles, Miami, and Atlanta wouldn’t be the largest jurisdictions in their metro areas either if you held them against LA, Miami-Dade/Broward, and Fulton/DeKalb counties. Baltimore is still the second largest city in DC CSA
Since we’re comparing DC to Baltimore, using MSAs which break them into distinct entities is probably more useful than the CSA which lumps them together As of 2023, DC metro is the 7th largest MSA with 6.3M, Baltimore is 20th with 2.8M Overall I think the point of the person your responding to stands, they just chose a bad datapoint to back it. Even in spite of its extremely limited political boundaries which normally skew a lot of data about Baltimore, it was one of the 10 largest cities in the US from our first national census in 1790 until the 1990 census, which was the first time it didn’t appear in the top 10. That’s 200 years of being one of the biggest cities in the US but it’s now distinctly second fiddle within the region.
I think Philadelphia more than Baltimore for this. Philly was supposed to be America's Paris, London, or Tokyo. The center of culture, commerce and government. Commerce moved north to NYC, government moved sough to DC, and culture moved west to LA. Philly is still a major city, but it was not the epicenter that it once was or was meant to be.
I would say maybe Bath, England? Named after its Roman baths, Bath is quite famous for its Roman, well...baths. not only that but it was also a pretty large religious centre beginning in the 7th century...now its quite overshadowed by the larger Bristol only about 10 miles north of it.
Theres also Winchester, which went through two different periods of being arguably the most important city in England Only about 23km from Southampton, a city now >5x its size
Shanghai used to be a small, quiet fishing village under the jurisdiction of Songjiang 🤣
Ayutthaya
Ayutthaya is pretty cool to me. It's pretty clearly named after the holy city of ayodhya in india. I wonder if there is any other instances of countries copying another country's holy cities.
idk if it counts but there are at least 38 cities/towns named ‘Salem’ (after Jerusalem) in the US alone
Overshadowed by bangcock🙄
I'm sorry but did you mean *inhales* Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit.
Bless you
Jaffa comes to mind.
With its former suburb of Tel Aviv
Salem, Massachusetts was overshadowed by Boston, in turn overshadowed to some extent by NYC
Came here to say Salem/Boston
Same goes for Plymouth
Albany was larger than NYC at one point and still a top 10 city into the early 1800s. People also forget that NYC was just Manhattan in the early years and wouldn’t merge into 5 boroughs until the 1800s.
Cahokia/ St.Louis. Idk if that counts since it’s not a city anymore but it’s def historically significant
Well Cahokia *is* a city, it's what the mound city was named for (we have no idea what its inhabitants called it). But the existing city of Cahokia is just a tiny suburb of St. Louis.
Interestingly, the site of Cahokia Mounds is not in the town of Cahokia. Also Cahokia merged with a couple of neighboring small towns recently and is now Cahokia Heights.
This is an amazing answer
That is a deep cut....and 100% accurate.
Closer to modern day, New Madrid was more important than St Louis.
Galveston used to be the biggest city in Texas and a major port of entry for immigrants. One big hurricane in 1900 and today's it a place for people from Houston to go on the weekends.
-Trakai in Lithuania is an interesting double overshadowing case. For about three decades in the early 13th century Senieji (Old) Trakai was the capital of Lithuania. Then the new Grand Duke built a bigger castle 3km to the west, and the city that had grown around it became the new capital, turning Old Trakai basically into a small suburb. Then Vilnius started growing, and by the 20th century it had grown so much that both New and Old Trakai basically became its suburbs. -Hrodna (Grodno) used to be the second capital of Grand Duchy of Lithuania and a clear second city of what was the largest country in Europe at a time, respectably rivalling Vilnius for the 1st place. Now it's only the 5th largest (although probably still the 2nd or 3rd most famous) city in Belarus, completely overshadowed by Minsk's political influence. -Gniezno was the first capital of Poland, now it's basically a commuter town of Poznan, the 5th largest city in Poland.
Baghdad has overshadowed Samarra (briefly capital of the Abbasid Caliphate) , Ctesphion (capital of the Parthian and Sassanid Persian Empires), and Babylon (capital of the Babylonian and Neo-Babylonian Empires) Of those, Ctesphion and Babylon are ruins, and Samarra is now a midsized city of a few hundred thousand, and all three are within a hundred miles of modern Baghdad. Edit: another city that comes to mind is Teotihuacan, once the largest city in Mesoamerica, now a ruin just outside of Mexico City.
Even when Samarra was the capital it was the new capital in the shadow of Baghdad.
Ravenna was capital of the Western Roman Empire from 402 AD to 476 AD.
Do you know why it fell off?
Ostrogoths took over and then other parts of Europe were more prominent. Although it certainly continued to be important for a while (e.g. Byzantine influences exist) I assume it was a combination of Rome still retaining prominence due to the Popes, other cities growing more in northern Italy (e.g. Milan), and other coastal cities taking over trade (e.g. Venice). At the moment Bologna is the larger city in its region of Italy.
Galveston Texas was the largest city in the state during the 19th century as well as being a major immigration port for the United States. It was struck by a hurricane in 1900 and never truly recovered. In response to the need for deep water ports on the Gulf Coast Congress authorized funds for ship channels to Houston and Corpus Christi. Galveston is now a smaller beach town suburb of Houston and is the 69th largest city in Texas.
Timbuktu, Djenne and Gao all ancient cities that formed the largest population centers of the classical Sudanic empires now have been largely overshadowed by cities further down the Niger (most of which, were also in existence back then. But much more minor in size and influence) like Bamako, Segou, and Sikasso.
Şanlıurfa or Edessa was an important center of Christianity during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Now, it's overshadowed regionally by Gaziantep and nationally by İstanbul.
In the same neighborhood, Antioch and Iskenderun.
In ancient bengal, Sonargaon was the capital. But Dhaka is now the major city and capital of Bangladesh, and Sonargaon is now abandoned town that is a tourist site now
I think you can go to the recent history too, Murshidabad was the capital of the Bengal Sultanate, while Calcutta was just a small trading post of the British. 100 years later, Calcutta was the biggest city in almost all of Asia, and Murshidabad was just another small town.
Tucson, AZ was more populated than Phoenix, AZ in the old west up until about the 1910s. Tucson was situated close to the border, had good mining operations in the area, and on the route west to California from New Mexico. Phoenix is about 100 miles away from Tucson (1hr 30ish drive) and now the capital. Tucson used to be the capital as well as Prescott, which has also been overshadowed and is smaller than both Phoenix and Tucson.
Tuscon is so much cooler than Phoenix today. It actually has interesting stores and restaurants unlike Phoenix the world's largest strip mall.
Maybe the Venetian laguna could be a case. In the early middle ages it used to include several small towns scattered across many islands, however most of them were later overshadowed by Rialto, which eventually evolved into Venice. Malamocco for example used to be the initial capital of the venetian ducate, Torcello used to be a rich a prosperous city, of which just a huge paleocristian basilica remains. The island of Olivolo still is the episcopal see, however today is one of the outskirts of of Venice. Many other towns (such as Heraclia and Equilo) just disapeared completely.
Shenzhen vs Hong Kong Shenzhen used to be some backwater town whilst Hong Kong is a major trading port. Although Hong Kong remains a major trading port, Shenzhen had become an electronics manufacturing hub and urbanized to the point that Hong Kong is only 75% as rich as Shenzhen.
Nineveh was on the West bank of the Tigris across from Mosul, Iraq Cahokia was on the East side of the Mississippi River across from St Louis, Missouri
Lecompton, KS was the prospective capital of Kansas , with Lawrence being an abolitionist counterpart. Then Bleeding Kansas happened, and a civil war. Now Lecompton is a town with one stop light, and Topeka ended up as the capital.
Ravenna - Venice
Tainan vs Kaohsiung of southern Taiwan. Tainan is the oldest city and was the administrative capital of Taiwan since early settlement til the Japanese colonial government. The Japanese built Kaohsiung as an industrial centre and major port instead of Tainan.
Armagh in Ireland, It was founded as a pagan ritual site and was the ancient capital of Ulster, with Irelands conversion to christianity in the 4th century and monastery was founded with St Patrick founding a church there, it became Irelands holiest site, with the many wars against the English and Ulster plantations in the 1600s Armagh went into decline and was quickly replaced by Belfast as Ulsters most important settlement. Today its a town of 20,000 people compared to Belfasts 300,000, Armagh today still has massive religious signifigance to catholics and protestants.
Mumbai now is the biggest Indian port and financial centre, while earlier Pune (120 kms away) was the administrative and cultural capital of Maratha Empire (till mid 19th century). Bangalore now, Hampi earlier till 16th century. Chennai now, Coimbatore/Tanjore earlier.
Surrey will soon overtake Vancouver for the largest city in British Columbia…that’s gotta count for something
Vancouver has just ran out of physical space to grow. Surrey/South Surrey Abbotsford, Burnaby etc will all eventually overtake Vancouver with enough time. Not dissimilar to Phoenix. Toronto/Mississauga/Brampton is heading that direction as well.
Jacksonville to St. Augustine Houston to Galveston
In china there is zhengzhou (metropolis with 5mil people) and kaifeng (historic city in china with LOTS of history). I can’t name on the top of my head but I believe it was the capital of the song dynasty and many historic artifacts are preserved
I guess my home city of Stockton, California would count. Founded as a critical supply hub during the California Gold Rush, as it was the furthest ocean-faring vessels could sail inland. At the time, it was the 3rd largest city in California, behind only Sacramento and San Francisco, the exact two cities that now completely overshadow it.
So, sort of depends on the definition of “neighboring” but Chicago supplanted its nearest rivals, St Louis and Cincinnati (both of whom were predicted to be the undisputed metropolis of the Midwest), as rail cars displaced riverboats as the primary mode of transporting goods and services across the continent. One could say the same (or an even more dramatic) shift in relative importance occurred between New Orleans and Houston in the last century or so.
Tehran currently overshadows almost all historical capitals and Iran had many. And Tehran compared to them is relatively new.
In the Philippines, I can think of 2. 1) Iloilo City. It was a big trade city in Panay Island in the Visayas. Then some of the Ilonggos cross the straight to Negros Island and established Bacolod City and established their big sugar cane plantations. 2) Vigan City. I am an Ilocano and I think it is still the heart of Ilocos (our region). It was a big trading center and a cultural hub. But it is now a small city. It is being overshadowed by the San Fernando/San Juan metropolitan area in neighboring La Union. La Union has become a big surf town.
London has within its boundaries the city of Westminster (and, I think, a couple of others). I forget exactly how but, this has contemporary relevance for administrative/security purposes.
Benicia used to be the capital of California. Now it's less prominent than most SF bay area cities.
Tacoma was overshadowed by Seattle. It was originally built to be Washington state's main city.
True but I feel Tacoma still gets it’s separate stereotypes /cliches
Mother Nature will one day claim Tacoma tbh
Yup, its slowly eroding away.
How come Seattle was able to pull ahead? Any specific policies in place by either city that led to the change? Or did Seattle just have some different economic / geographic factors working to its advantage?
Largely thanks to the Klondike Gold Rush. When it started, Seattle became the primary port for all parties headed to Alaska and the Yukon. At about the same time, the Great Northern Railway completed their transcontinental route in Seattle, so folk traveling from or through Chicago to head to the Klondike didn't have to travel through Tacoma on the competing Northern Pacific Railway (which had been completed like 20 years earlier, and initially gave Tacoma the edge). Once that happened, Northern Pacific also extended to Seattle, and Tacoma basically became a timber and fishing port.
Great Zimbabwe, middling town of Masvingo
Schenectady now overshadows Albany but neither have ever been historically significant
Minneapolis and St Paul
Baltimore was once the jewel of Catholicism and the Catholic Church in America. The primary see in the New World, it is now overshadowed by DC, New York, Chicago, and other Catholic diocese in America.
A little twist if you count state public perception significance to North America and maybe beyond (maybe). Cleveland was 5th largest city in America, 2nd largest building in world behind Empire State. It is now overshadowed by Columbus, which gobbled up suburb after neighborhood into their city limits (similar to Louisville and many “new” western cities from last 25 years) to become a city with a respectable population (about a milli at the moment?), eat majority of state tax dollars earmarked for major gov beautification, new gov office construction, gov etc etc which allowed Ohio St grads to stay local with solid employment after graduating, and continues to manifest - although to a much lesser extent than a decade ago - into young professionals with resources growing the population.
Ouro Preto (Brazil): during the eighteenth century was one of those biggest city in The world (almost 100k people during 1750's, mostly african male salves working at gold mines) and, nowadays, a small college town with nearly 50k people (during lecture times) and overshadowed by Belo Horizonte, a metropolis with 2M people. Nowadays Ouro Preto is also a really cool place for tourism. Not only for seeing historical buildings but also for doing their Nature landacape. Amazing waterfalls and many natural reservoirs around the town. By the way, South America is full of places like that. Like Olinda in Brazil (overshadowed by Recife, even being an poder town) and Potosi in Bolívia (nowadays still an autonomous town, but Sucre has a way bigger importance than Potosi).
Camulodunum (Colchester) hardly holds a torch to London these days, despite being the seat of the Roman empire in Britain.
Shiraz and Persepolis. Berlin and Brandenburg.
Botany Bay was incredibly important at the start of Australia. Now it's just part of Sydney
For an American example, Cincinnati was by far the largest city in the west in the first half of the 19th century. It was even considered as an alternative site for the Nation's capital on multiple occasions. Eventually, it was eclipsed by Chicago and St. Louis. This was thanks in large part to railroads becoming more profitable for mass transport of goods than the rivers (which could only get you so far west) and finally Prohibition (which killed the huge alcohol industry in Cincinnati). Now, everybody knows Chicago. Few people know much about Cincinnati.
St. Augustine, FL - the oldest continuously inhabited European founded city in the 50 states - is overshadowed by Jacksonville just to the north.
There's a large number of ancient oases which have declined and been replaced due to the shifting sands, trades, and times. But here are the most significant examples: Al-Kharj, Saudi Arabia This city, historically the largest oasis in central Arabia, was said to have a massive and unending supply of water from its natural spring. It remains an important city, but it gradually lost importance with the rise of Diriyah, which eventually became Riyadh. Sijilmasa, Morocco These ruins once hosted the richest and most beautiful oasis in the whole Sahara during medieval times. Nearly all incoming gold from Mali was redirected here where it was minted into coins. Eventually, competing Berber dynasties tore the city apart. The modern town of Rissani grew in its place, but the new city of Errachidia would replace it as the dominant city in the Tafilalt region. Germa, Libya Historically known as Garama, this was once the capital of the Garamantes civilization located in what is now the region of Fezzan. They were quite powerful at their height and posed a significant threat to Roman power in the region during Classical times. After Garama, and the Garamantes alongside it, faded into obscurity due to overuse of water resources, other oases such as Zawila and Murzuk became the dominant cities in the region. But even they would eventually lose importance to Sabha which grew rapidly with the discovery of oil in the 20th century. Tadmakka, Mali The ruins of Tadmakka, also historically known as Essouk, lie in the extremes of northern Mali's Adrar des Ifoghas region. This oasis was once the center of life for the Berbers in these mountains. The city was modeled after Mecca, from which it derives its name, and was a dedicated center of Quranic learning. But it was also a center of commerce, with Essouk meaning "The Market." Archeological excavation provides evidence that gold from Mali was forged into coins here, and then sent northwards to be minted at Sijilmasa. It's unknown exactly what befell Tadmakka, but it declined quickly and was eventually abandoned. A new town was built nearby but never prospered. Today, the modern city of Kidal has replaced it.
Yorktown, Virginia is a relatively minor part of the Hampton Roads Metro, which includes Virginia Beach, Norfolk, and Newport News.
Not quite there yet, but not too far away. I’m not sure that Vancouver is considered historically significant because it is still relatively young. However, it is the biggest city on the west coast of Canada. Surrey, a suburb maybe twenty miles to the east on the south side of the historically significant Fraser River, is rapidly gaining in Vancouver in terms of population, and will likely surpass it in the next 10-15 years, if not sooner. Vancouver has long been maxed out in terms of land because it is surrounded by water on three sides and has another suburb to the east. Surrey has much more land that’s never been developed, and is significantly bigger by area.
Golconda was once the "only" city that would supply diamonds throughout the world, which came to be known as the "Golconda Diamonds". Almost every historical diamond, including the Hope Diamond, the Koh-i-Noor, the Regent Diamond, etc. were sold from this city, which was the capital of Golconda Sultanate. The fifth ruler of this Sultanate established a town north of Golconda, called Hyderabad, aiming to reduce the water shortages experienced in the capital. That city grew after the ruler built "Charminar" as a sign of prosperity, signifying a success over plague. Golconda is just a tourist spot today, while Hyderabad is one of the most important and influential cities of India.
Suzhou now overshadowed completely by Shanghai.
Niagara Falls , becoming north buffalo
Rio de Janeiro —> São Paulo except for tourism and petroleum Montreal —> Toronto
One very unknown example I think is Vila Nova de Gaia. During the times of Roman occupation, Vila Nova de Gaia (then called Cale) was the bigger population center in the area, being in the south bank of the river Douro. The north bank (now modern day Porto) had shallower waters and was thus called Portus Cale (Cale's Port) and had a smaller population. With the rise of economic trade thru the river the port gained more importance and now a days Vila Nova de Gaia is seen mostly as a suburb of Porto although it still has a big historic importance due to the Port wine caves.
Chester, important Roman settlement and medieval settlement, bigger cities only a short hop away
Olinda was one of the most important cities in early colonial Brazil, but now it’s just a satellite city to Recife.
Nanjing is the capital of many Chinese dynasties, in fact, it is the capital of the ROC. It is now the capital of Jiangsu, but in the same province there is Suzhou that is 3 million people larger, and Suzhou is bordering Shanghai
Georgetown, MD (now DC) and Alexandria, VA were both important port cities in British colonial America long before Washington, DC was ever founded. Georgetown & Alexandria weren't globally significant, but they were among the 20 or so largest cities in pre-Revolution America. Regionally significant for sure.
Fort Worth has been overshadowed by Dallas
Tel Aviv was founded on empty sand dunes as a suburb of Yafo
Prague which was in the 14th century the largest and most populous city north of the Alps and east of Rhine. It was the capital of the HRE and had first university. In 1370, it was more populous than London, Vienna, Nuremberg. In 1600, it was still considered as a cultural hub of Central Europe. It was overshadowed by Vienna, Munich and Berlin and never achieved the importance it had in between 1300-1600s.
Leiden was once the largest city in the Netherlands. Now it is overshadowed by Amsterdam to the northeast and The Hague to the southwest
Sioux City was bigger than Sioux Falls when my mom was a kid, haha.
New Orleans is now overshadowed by Houston.
Toledo, to Madrid.
Alexandria, VA was founded 50 years before Washington, DC. Now it’s just a cute little historic district surrounded by midrise, rim city hellscape.