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These weren't "accidents"; they provided shade, broke the wind, and made the city easier to defend against invaders. 5. Renaissance and Baroque: The City as Art
To understand the history of urban form before the Industrial Revolution is to study a slow evolution from the nomadic camp to the monumental metropolis. It is a history defined by three distinct paradigms: the , the Planned , and the Mercantile .
Before the Industrial Revolution, cities were generally small, with populations ranging from a few thousand to a few hundred thousand. They were often compact and densely populated, with a strong focus on local trade and commerce.
The most authoritative resource for this topic is seminal book, History of Urban Form: Before the Industrial Revolutions