Cities

The urban settlements this atlas documents for their own geographic frame, population, area and physical setting, grouped into twenty two sub categories by the UN M49 intermediate subregion their sovereign country belongs to. A city's political status and historical development are left to Political and History, this atlas's sibling atlases, under the ruling 713 ownership principle; this band carries the place itself, its coordinates, its climate and its physical relationship to the landforms and water around it. Ruling 753 sets no size floor, so this band grows toward comprehensive real-world coverage of every notable settlement, not a curated shortlist of capitals and megacities.