San Francisco: History
Everything changes in 1848. Gold turns up in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and San Francisco’s population explodes from a few hundred people to tens of thousands within a…
History
Barcelona: History
Barcelona’s history is inseparable from its Catalan identity — the city has been the capital of Catalonia, a distinct Romance-language-speaking region with its own culture and political aspirations,…
Istanbul: History
Istanbul’s history runs deep enough that it’s genuinely hard to compress — founded as Byzantium by Greek colonists around 657 BC, the city’s real transformation began in 330…
Reykjavik: History
Reykjavik’s founding is traditionally dated to 874 AD, when Ingolfur Arnarson, generally regarded as Iceland’s first permanent Norse settler, established a farmstead at the site according to the…
Abu Dhabi: History
Abu Dhabi’s leap from a modest pearling and fishing settlement to a genuine global capital is almost entirely the story of one man: Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al…
Marrakech: History
Marrakech was founded in 1062 by the Almoravid dynasty — Berber Muslim rulers who, at their height, controlled territory stretching from Morocco into Muslim Spain. The city was…
Petra: History
Petra was the capital of the Nabataean kingdom — Arab traders who, from around the 4th century BC, controlled the key stretches of the incense and spice routes…
Rio de Janeiro: History
Rio de Janeiro was founded by Portuguese colonists in 1565, and its name, meaning January River, stems from an early navigational error — the first Portuguese explorers who…
Kyoto: History
Kyoto became Japan’s imperial capital in 794 AD under Emperor Kanmu, who named his new city Heian-kyo. It held that position — seat of the imperial court —…
Sydney: History
Sydney’s story as a European settlement starts in 1788, when the First Fleet arrived at what’s now Circular Quay and established what would become continuous British settlement in…