Precolonial Urbanisms

by

Monika Baumanová

• LAST REVIEWED: 20 February 2024
• LAST MODIFIED: 20 February 2024
• DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780190922481-0040

Introduction

Urbanism as a phenomenon of human culture has been a popular theme for research in many academic disciplines, including architecture, anthropology, archaeology, sociology, and geography. Near Eastern and European case studies served as the ultimate definition of urbanism well into the 1980s and inspired the compilation of several “trait lists,” which were used to classify precolonial settlements in the rest of the world. However, as a consequence of this tendency, which then dominated academic research, many cultural traditions recognized as urban today and multiple forms of the built environment were for a long time denied their urban status. This is especially the case of precolonial towns and cities of the Global South, which importance was downplayed and misinterpreted, also for political reasons, in the colonial and early postcolonial era. This article reverses the traditional approach and, in terms of regional works, it focuses specifically on the precolonial urban traditions that may be found in the Americas, Africa, and South and East Asia, while the urban traditions of Europe, Egypt, and the Near East are mentioned only for comparison. The geographical areas discussed here have been most intensively studied by archaeologists, who collect and analyze the material evidence with the ever-increasing use of interdisciplinary approaches. Today, archaeological research highlights the global variety of cultural heritage and human experience as well as the multitude of unique forms and structures of cities that flourished outside of and/or preceded modern European colonial influence. A range of theoretical stances and methodological approaches have been developed that strive to uncover the unique aspects of urbanisms that predated or took shape independently of the era of modern European colonialism, such as social organization, economics, architectural styles, cultural traditions, or sensory perception. There have also been developments in the field of comparative approaches that highlight and reflect on the underlying aspects of urbanism shared between societies or making them unique. On their basis, we can arrive at understanding the built environments as representations of social configurations and traditions.

General Overviews

The best general overviews currently available are represented by volumes that adopt a global perspective and which are continually updated and reproduced in new editions, as well as by new monographs that provide fresh viewpoints. Fisher and Creekmore 2014 presents a global scope, which today serves students and professionals from multiple fields. Gates 2011 and Clark 2013 can be contrasted in their different disciplinary perspectives, while both provide views on the ancient urban past of regions in a geographical neighborhood of Europe; the former focuses on materiality of the built environment and the latter presents past developments almost exclusively based on written records. While Marcus and Sabloff 2008 contributes with a comparative perspective on the “Old and New World,” Walker, et al. 2020 compares urbanism in an Islamic context from Europe across Africa to Asia. Historical and archaeological interpretations like those of Brunn, et al. 2020 rightly inform current developments and shape scientific outlooks into the future. Sinclair, et al. 2010 exemplifies the opening up of new vistas in theoretical research relevant for urban studies as practiced across various disciplines.

• Brunn, Stanley D., Donald J. Zeigler, Maureen Hays-Mitchell, and Jessica K. Graybill. Cities of the World: Regional Patterns and Urban Environments. 7th ed. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2020.

  A comprehensive general review, which focuses mostly on present-day cities and their future prospects. However, it also considers the past and, in many cases, precolonial developments of urbanism, e.g., in the Americas, and provides reflections on the nature of the colonial impact on urbanism in each region. Includes contributions from the fields of historical geography, history, and urban studies.

• Clark, Peter, ed. The Oxford Handbook of Cities in World History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

  Although written from the perspective of historians and somewhat disregarding the importance of archaeological studies and contexts on which no written evidence is available, and which are crucial for understanding precolonial urbanism in most of the world, this volume represents an easily accessible work with detailed reference lists for follow-up reading on individual regions. Especially useful for its overview of urban histories in Europe, the Near East, and Asia, including discussions of urban economy and the environment.

• Fisher, Kevin D., and Andrew Creekmore, eds. Making Ancient Cities: Space and Place in Early Urban Societies. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014.

  In terms of precolonial cities, this book focuses especially on East Africa and the Americas. As for the general theme of early urbanism, it takes case studies from all continents. The introductory chapter by the editors and the second chapter on the cities in Upper Mesopotamia are especially excellent introductions into the local issues, as well as to the general present-day thinking about urbanisms, which are preserved mostly through material/archaeological evidence.

• Gates, Charles. Ancient Cities: The Archaeology of Urban Life in the Ancient Near East and Egypt, Greece, and Rome. 2d ed. New York: Routledge, 2011.

  DOI: 10.4324/9780203830574

  Although the popularity of this volume is still limited to the field of archaeology, it deserves a much greater attention by those who wish to understand socio-spatial causalities of urban developments in the Mediterranean in premodern times.

• Marcus, Joyce, and Jeremy A. Sabloff. The Ancient City: New Perspectives on Urbanism in the Old and New World. Santa Fe, NM: School for Advanced Research Press, 2008.

  Although slightly outdated now, this overview presents features that characterized early urbanism on each continent, focusing on comparing the trajectories of the Old and New Worlds. The reader gets a perspective on how in some regions, urbanism may have relied on relations with the countryside, while elsewhere cities were centers of cult or administration. The authors discuss the various extent to which they were planned and how power management was reflected in the urban structure.

• Sinclair, Paul, Gullög Nordquist, Frands Herschend, and Christian Isendahl, eds. The Urban Mind: Cultural and Environmental Dynamics. Uppsala, Sweden: Uppsala University, 2010.

  A landmark publication that resulted from a project on precolonial urbanism undertaken at Uppsala University and contains case studies from various continents, especially from Africa and the Mediterranean. Focuses on precolonial, classical, and preindustrial cities. The individual studies are concerned with issues like urban layouts and socio-spatial organization and present arguments for both qualitative and quantitative methods of urban analyses used in archaeology.

• Walker, Bethany J., Timothy Insoll, and Corisande Fenwick, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Archaeology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020.

  With its focus on the Islamic world, the volume takes a global perspective, covering urban development in the Islamic context that took place from the seventh century CE to the present. In Islamic context, urbanism has always been a desirable lifestyle, perceived as facilitating proper life. Hence, there is a long tradition of urbanization linked to the spread of Islam from southern Europe to Africa and all the way to the Far East. The volume looks at the state of research on the historical and modern built environment in individual regions.