An urban area is a human settlement with a high population density and an infrastructure of built environment . This is the core of a metropolitan statistical area in the United States, if it contains a population of more than 50,000.
133-506: Zahlé ( Arabic : زَحْلة ) is a city in eastern Lebanon, and the capital and largest city of Beqaa Governorate , Lebanon . With around 150,000 inhabitants, it is the third-largest city in Lebanon after Beirut and Tripoli and the fourth-largest taking the whole urban area (the Jounieh urban area is larger). Zahlé is located 55 km (34 mi) east of the capital Beirut, close to
266-500: A Built-up area (BUA) as an area of built-up land of at least 20 hectares (0.077 sq mi), separated from other settlements by at least 200 metres (660 ft). For 2011 census data there are 5,493 built-up areas, of which 501 are divided into Built-up area sub-divisions (BUASD) for which data is also available. Each built-up area is named algorithmically, using Ordnance Survey place-name data. The ONS has produced census results from urban areas since 1951, since 1981 based upon
399-457: A human impact on the environment . In 1950, 764 million people or about 30 percent of the world's 2.5 billion people lived in urban areas. By 2014, it was 3.9 billion or about 53 percent of the world's 7.3 billion people that lived in urban areas. The change was driven by a combination of increased total population and increased percent of population living in urban areas. In 2009, the number of people living in urban areas (3.42 billion) surpassed
532-480: A building at least every 200 m (660 ft) and at least 200 people. To be considered a town or a city ( kaupunki ) for statistical purposes, an urban area must have at least 15,000 people. This is not to be confused with the city / town designation used by municipalities . In France , an urban area ( Fr: aire d'attraction d'une ville ) is a zone encompassing an area of built-up growth (called an "urban unit" ( unité urbaine ) – close in definition to
665-470: A civil airport serving the town and the whole valley. A regional airport could prove vital when the road to Beirut is closed because of heavy snowfall. However, the project froze in the early 2000s, after the runway extension had been initiated. The banks of the Berdawni River have long been a place where people of Zahlé and other parts of Lebanon come to socialize. The town's most popular attraction
798-575: A collection of related dialects that constitute the precursor of Arabic, first emerged during the Iron Age . Previously, the earliest attestation of Old Arabic was thought to be a single 1st century CE inscription in Sabaic script at Qaryat al-Faw , in southern present-day Saudi Arabia. However, this inscription does not participate in several of the key innovations of the Arabic language group, such as
931-435: A corpus of poetic texts, in addition to Qur'an usage and Bedouin informants whom he considered to be reliable speakers of the ʿarabiyya . Arabic spread with the spread of Islam . Following the early Muslim conquests , Arabic gained vocabulary from Middle Persian and Turkish . In the early Abbasid period , many Classical Greek terms entered Arabic through translations carried out at Baghdad's House of Wisdom . By
1064-653: A densely settled core created from census blocks and contiguous qualifying territory that together have at least 2,000 housing units or 5,000 persons." There were 2,646 urban areas identified by the Census Bureau for 2020. 511 of these had a population of 50,000 or more. For the 2000 and 2010 censuses, the Census Bureau differentiated between two kinds of urban areas: urbanized areas and urban clusters. The term urbanized area denoted an urban area of 50,000 or more people. Urban areas under 50,000 people were called urban clusters . Urbanized areas were first delineated in
1197-543: A density requirement of 4,000 inhabitants per square kilometre (10,000/sq mi). Seoul is the largest urban area in South Korea . For the Census of India 2011, the definition of urban area is a place having a minimum population of 5,000 of density 400 persons per square kilometre (1,000/sq mi) or higher, and 75% plus of the male working population employed in non-agricultural activities. Places administered by
1330-1081: A dialect of Arabic and written in the Latin alphabet . The Balkan languages, including Albanian, Greek , Serbo-Croatian, and Bulgarian , have also acquired many words of Arabic origin, mainly through direct contact with Ottoman Turkish . Arabic has influenced languages across the globe throughout its history, especially languages where Islam is the predominant religion and in countries that were conquered by Muslims. The most markedly influenced languages are Persian , Turkish , Hindustani ( Hindi and Urdu ), Kashmiri , Kurdish , Bosnian , Kazakh , Bengali , Malay ( Indonesian and Malaysian ), Maldivian , Pashto , Punjabi , Albanian , Armenian , Azerbaijani , Sicilian, Spanish, Greek, Bulgarian, Tagalog , Sindhi , Odia , Hebrew and African languages such as Hausa , Amharic , Tigrinya , Somali , Tamazight , and Swahili . Conversely, Arabic has borrowed some words (mostly nouns) from other languages, including its sister-language Aramaic, Persian, Greek, and Latin and to
1463-514: A large majority of the population, typically 75%, is not engaged in agriculture and/or fishing is sometimes used. Since 2000, China 's cities have expanded at an average rate of 10% annually. It is estimated that China's urban population will increase by 292 million people by 2050, when its cities will house a combined population of over one billion. The country's urbanization rate increased from 17.4% to 46.6% between 1978 and 2009. Between 150 and 200 million migrant workers work part-time in
SECTION 10
#17327936807201596-487: A lesser extent and more recently from Turkish, English, French, and Italian. Arabic is spoken by as many as 380 million speakers, both native and non-native, in the Arab world, making it the fifth most spoken language in the world, and the fourth most used language on the internet in terms of users. It also serves as the liturgical language of more than 2 billion Muslims . In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked Arabic
1729-690: A millennium before the modern period . Early lexicographers ( لُغَوِيُّون lughawiyyūn ) sought to explain words in the Quran that were unfamiliar or had a particular contextual meaning, and to identify words of non-Arabic origin that appear in the Quran. They gathered shawāhid ( شَوَاهِد 'instances of attested usage') from poetry and the speech of the Arabs—particularly the Bedouin ʾaʿrāb [ ar ] ( أَعْراب ) who were perceived to speak
1862-572: A municipal corporation, cantonment board or notified town area committee are automatically considered urban areas. The Census of India 2011 also defined the term "urban agglomeration" as an integrated urban area consisting of a core town together with its "outgrowths" (contiguous suburbs). In Pakistan , an area is a major city and municipality if it has more than 100,000 inhabitants according to census results. Cities include adjacent cantonments . Urbanisation in Pakistan has increased since
1995-507: A number of large cities . The largest conurbation is the Rhine-Ruhr region (11 million in 2008 ), including Düsseldorf (the capital of North Rhine-Westphalia ), Cologne , Bonn , Dortmund , Essen , Duisburg , and Bochum . The Netherlands is the 30th-most densely populated country in the world, with 404.6 inhabitants per square kilometre (1,048/sq mi)—or 497 inhabitants per square kilometre (1,287/sq mi) if only
2128-641: A population centre remains unchanged from that of an urban area: a population of at least 1,000 people where the density is no fewer than 400 persons per km . Mexico is one of many countries where the urbanization rate is at least 80%. Mexico City , its capital, is the largest urban area in the country. In the United States , the Census Bureau defines urban areas and delineates urban area boundaries after each census. The Bureau defines an urban area as "a statistical geographic entity consisting of
2261-430: A population of 386,362 people in the town proper, making it the country's fourth largest. (The locals tend to give figures of 200,000 or 300,000 inhabitants, which, however, are misleading and completely unrealistic.) The urban area includes the neighbouring towns of Saadnayel , Taalabaya , Chtaura and Jdita to the southwest, which have come to form a single urban entity since the late 1990s due to unplanned growth, and
2394-594: A result, many European languages have borrowed words from it. Arabic influence, mainly in vocabulary, is seen in European languages (mainly Spanish and to a lesser extent Portuguese , Catalan , and Sicilian ) owing to the proximity of Europe and the long-lasting Arabic cultural and linguistic presence, mainly in Southern Iberia, during the Al-Andalus era. Maltese is a Semitic language developed from
2527-462: A script derived from ASA attest to a language known as Hasaitic . On the northwestern frontier of Arabia, various languages known to scholars as Thamudic B , Thamudic D, Safaitic , and Hismaic are attested. The last two share important isoglosses with later forms of Arabic, leading scholars to theorize that Safaitic and Hismaic are early forms of Arabic and that they should be considered Old Arabic . Linguists generally believe that "Old Arabic",
2660-519: A section of a Roman aqueduct). Furthermore, there are several ancient sites of interest in nearby locations: Two more sites worth visiting are a more distant trip away: Zahlé's culture has long revolved around its signature crop, the grape, and its products, wine and arak. Arak, in particular, has traditionally been served in cafés at virtually any time of the day. The city is known as "the City of Wine and Poetry". Zahlé's most important cultural event
2793-470: A single language, despite mutual incomprehensibility among differing spoken versions. From a linguistic standpoint, it is often said that the various spoken varieties of Arabic differ among each other collectively about as much as the Romance languages . This is an apt comparison in a number of ways. The period of divergence from a single spoken form is similar—perhaps 1500 years for Arabic, 2000 years for
SECTION 20
#17327936807202926-409: A suburb of another urban area rather than as a self-contained urban entity, or is geographically remote from other urban communities. Accordingly, the new definition set out three distinct types of population centres: small (population 1,000 to 29,999), medium (population 30,000 to 99,999) and large (population 100,000 or greater). Despite the change in terminology, however, the demographic definition of
3059-507: A type of Arabic. Cypriot Arabic is recognized as a minority language in Cyprus. The sociolinguistic situation of Arabic in modern times provides a prime example of the linguistic phenomenon of diglossia , which is the normal use of two separate varieties of the same language, usually in different social situations. Tawleed is the process of giving a new shade of meaning to an old classical word. For example, al-hatif lexicographically means
3192-507: A variety of regional vernacular Arabic dialects , which are not necessarily mutually intelligible. Classical Arabic is the language found in the Quran , used from the period of Pre-Islamic Arabia to that of the Abbasid Caliphate . Classical Arabic is prescriptive, according to the syntactic and grammatical norms laid down by classical grammarians (such as Sibawayh ) and the vocabulary defined in classical dictionaries (such as
3325-476: A wider audience." In the wake of the industrial revolution and European hegemony and colonialism , pioneering Arabic presses, such as the Amiri Press established by Muhammad Ali (1819), dramatically changed the diffusion and consumption of Arabic literature and publications. Rifa'a al-Tahtawi proposed the establishment of Madrasat al-Alsun in 1836 and led a translation campaign that highlighted
3458-428: Is 'irreversibly urban in character', meaning that they are characteristic of a town or city. They include areas of built-up land with a minimum of 20 hectares (200,000 m ; 49 acres). Any areas [separated by] less than 200 metres [of non-urban space] are linked to become a single built-up area. Argentina and Japan are countries where the urbanization rate is over 90% while Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Mexico and
3591-737: Is a Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world . The ISO assigns language codes to 32 varieties of Arabic , including its standard form of Literary Arabic, known as Modern Standard Arabic , which is derived from Classical Arabic . This distinction exists primarily among Western linguists; Arabic speakers themselves generally do not distinguish between Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic, but rather refer to both as al-ʿarabiyyatu l-fuṣḥā ( اَلعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ "the eloquent Arabic") or simply al-fuṣḥā ( اَلْفُصْحَىٰ ). Arabic
3724-415: Is a 300-metre (984 ft) promenade along the river, referred to as "Al Wadi" ("the valley"). Sheltered between the ravine's limestone cliffs, it is lined up with large outdoor restaurants, cafes and playrooms, and shaded by trees. These restaurants specialize in traditional Lebanese meze served with arak . The promenade is closed during late fall and winter, when cold winds from the mountain sweep through
3857-582: Is a chapel that can seat a little over a hundred people. The top of the tower features sweeping views over Zahlé and the Bekaa Valley. This Ottoman building was constructed in 1850 to serve as the town's Serail . Located just downhill from Our Lady of Zahlé and Bekaa, it is a mix of local and Ottoman architecture, and features an atrium occupied by an inner garden and surrounded by arcades. Though still known as "the Old Serail", it currently serves as
3990-590: Is a minimum level of comprehension between all Arabic dialects, this level can increase or decrease based on geographic proximity: for example, Levantine and Gulf speakers understand each other much better than they do speakers from the Maghreb. The issue of diglossia between spoken and written language is a complicating factor: A single written form, differing sharply from any of the spoken varieties learned natively, unites several sometimes divergent spoken forms. For political reasons, Arabs mostly assert that they all speak
4123-559: Is a sister language rather than their direct ancestor. Arabia had a wide variety of Semitic languages in antiquity. The term "Arab" was initially used to describe those living in the Arabian Peninsula , as perceived by geographers from ancient Greece . In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside the Ancient South Arabian family (e.g. Southern Thamudic) were spoken. It
Zahlé - Misplaced Pages Continue
4256-476: Is also said to have left Baalbek then to avoid expropriation by the Harfushes and established itself as one of the premier commercial households of Sidon and later even served as consuls of Iran . At the end of the 18th century, Zahlé had one thousand inhabitants and two hundred houses. By 1820, Zahlé's population had grown to 5,000. By 1850 it was 7,000 to 8,000 and the town had become the commercial centre for
4389-493: Is an area with a population of at least 1,000 people where the density is no fewer than 400 persons per square kilometre (1,000/sq mi). If two or more urban areas are within 2 km (1.2 mi) of each other by road, they are merged into a single urban area, provided they do not cross census metropolitan area or census agglomeration boundaries. In the Canada 2011 Census , Statistics Canada redesignated urban areas with
4522-478: Is believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages (non-Central Semitic languages) were spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hejaz , Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages. In Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested. In eastern Arabia, inscriptions in
4655-484: Is considered to be rural by the Census Bureau. The largest urban area in the United States is that of New York City and its surrounding suburbs. The New York– Jersey City – Newark , NY–NJ urban area had a population of 19,426,449 as of 2020, while the larger metropolitan area had a population of 20,140,470, and the combined statistical area had a population of 23,582,649. The next five largest urban areas in
4788-408: Is credited with establishing the rules of Arabic prosody . Al-Jahiz (776–868) proposed to Al-Akhfash al-Akbar an overhaul of the grammar of Arabic, but it would not come to pass for two centuries. The standardization of Arabic reached completion around the end of the 8th century. The first comprehensive description of the ʿarabiyya "Arabic", Sībawayhi's al - Kitāb , is based first of all upon
4921-472: Is credited with standardizing Arabic grammar , or an-naḥw ( النَّحو "the way" ), and pioneering a system of diacritics to differentiate consonants ( نقط الإعجام nuqaṭu‿l-i'jām "pointing for non-Arabs") and indicate vocalization ( التشكيل at-tashkīl ). Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi (718–786) compiled the first Arabic dictionary, Kitāb al-'Ayn ( كتاب العين "The Book of the Letter ع "), and
5054-686: Is divided into 5 regions for planning purposes by the URA, even though as a city state Singapore is defined as a single continuous urban area. It is further subdivided into 55 urban planning areas , which acts as the boundaries of planned towns within the country. In Vietnam , there are six types of urban areas: Bangkok is the largest urban area in Thailand . As in other Nordic countries , an urban area ( taajama in Finnish ) in Finland must have
5187-423: Is due to be replaced by a new, multimillion-dollar highway as the main international route; however, the completion date is still unclear. Zahlé is also connected to Baalbek (36 km (22 mi) to the northeast) by the trans-Beqaa road, which continues further north towards Homs , Syria. Due to widespread car ownership, public transportation remains underdeveloped. There is a single bus line, which runs on
5320-556: Is famous for. Zahlé saw at a time a prosperous commercial activity due to its location midway between Beirut and Damascus. Paradoxically, it regained some of that activity during the civil war, when the growing instability in Beirut led to a decentralization of the economy. Furthermore, taxation was nonexistent due to the collapse of State authority, which Zahlé took advantage of to expand its industrial and commercial sectors. A number of companies and state bodies have their headquarters for
5453-550: Is highly urbanized. The ten largest metropolitan areas account for half of the population, and fewer than one in ten live in rural areas. About 3 million people live in Buenos Aires City and the Greater Buenos Aires metropolitan area totals around 15 million, making it one of the largest urban areas in the world, with a population of 18 million all up. Córdoba has around 1.5 million people living in
Zahlé - Misplaced Pages Continue
5586-687: Is home to about 100,000 people. The metropolitan area extends over much of the Zahlé District and additionally comprises: with a total population close to 200,000. Religion in Zahlé, Lebanon Zahlé is one of the largest predominantly Christian town in Lebanon and the Middle East (with Christians once forming around 90% of its total population during the French occupation) and the one with
5719-417: Is larger, but contains considerably fewer trees). The park houses a collection of marble tables with mosaic depictions of several sites in Lebanon, a small pond with waterlilies, a semi-circular marble tholos, and several sculptures representing famous locals. In 2003, the municipality covered a 25 m (82 ft) fir (the park's tallest) with thousands of lights, in an attempt to break the world record for
5852-574: Is not present in the spoken varieties, but deletes Classical words that sound obsolete in MSA. In addition, MSA has borrowed or coined many terms for concepts that did not exist in Quranic times, and MSA continues to evolve. Some words have been borrowed from other languages—notice that transliteration mainly indicates spelling and not real pronunciation (e.g., فِلْم film 'film' or ديمقراطية dīmuqrāṭiyyah 'democracy'). The current preference
5985-855: Is official in Mali and recognized as a minority language in Morocco, while the Senegalese government adopted the Latin script to write it. Maltese is official in (predominantly Catholic ) Malta and written with the Latin script . Linguists agree that it is a variety of spoken Arabic, descended from Siculo-Arabic , though it has experienced extensive changes as a result of sustained and intensive contact with Italo-Romance varieties, and more recently also with English. Due to "a mix of social, cultural, historical, political, and indeed linguistic factors", many Maltese people today consider their language Semitic but not
6118-952: Is one of the most urbanised countries in the world, with more than 50% of the population residing in Australia's three biggest urban centres. Statistics New Zealand defines urban areas in New Zealand, which are independent of any administrative subdivisions and have no legal basis. There are four classes of urban area: major urban areas (population 100,000+), large urban areas (population 30,000–99,999), medium urban areas (population 10,000–29,999) and small urban areas (population 1,000–9,999). As of 2021, there are 7 major urban areas, 13 large urban areas, 22 medium urban areas and 136 small urban areas. Urban areas are reclassified after each New Zealand census , so population changes between censuses does not change an urban area's classification. According to Statistics Canada , an urban area in Canada
6251-572: Is the third most widespread official language after English and French, one of six official languages of the United Nations , and the liturgical language of Islam . Arabic is widely taught in schools and universities around the world and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, governments and the media. During the Middle Ages , Arabic was a major vehicle of culture and learning, especially in science, mathematics and philosophy. As
6384-459: Is the "Festival of the Vine", traditionally held each September, during which concerts, plays, poetry evenings and artistic exhibitions are organized daily over the course of two or three weeks. The final Saturday evening features the crowning of the "Maid of the Vine", the local beauty queen , and the next afternoon, the festival closes with arguably its most popular event: a parade of floats held on
6517-506: Is the largest city by population and area, with a population of 19.10 million. In Bangladesh , there are total 11 City Corporations and 329 Municipal Corporations and 203 Small towns , which serves as the center for Upazilas . According to 2011 population census, Bangladesh has an urban population of 28%, with a growth rate of 2.8%. At this growth rate, it is estimated that the urban population of Bangladesh will reach 79 million or 42% of total population by 2035. In 2020, 54 percent of
6650-590: Is the variety used in most current, printed Arabic publications, spoken by some of the Arabic media across North Africa and the Middle East, and understood by most educated Arabic speakers. "Literary Arabic" and "Standard Arabic" ( فُصْحَى fuṣḥá ) are less strictly defined terms that may refer to Modern Standard Arabic or Classical Arabic. Some of the differences between Classical Arabic (CA) and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) are as follows: MSA uses much Classical vocabulary (e.g., dhahaba 'to go') that
6783-413: Is to avoid direct borrowings, preferring to either use loan translations (e.g., فرع farʻ 'branch', also used for the branch of a company or organization; جناح janāḥ 'wing', is also used for the wing of an airplane, building, air force, etc.), or to coin new words using forms within existing roots ( استماتة istimātah ' apoptosis ', using the root موت m/w/t 'death' put into
SECTION 50
#17327936807206916-524: Is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the industrial and post-industrial era , especially in modern times. Due to its grounding in Classical Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic is removed over a millennium from everyday speech, which is construed as a multitude of dialects of this language. These dialects and Modern Standard Arabic are described by some scholars as not mutually comprehensible. The former are usually acquired in families, while
7049-445: The Lisān al-ʻArab ). Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) largely follows the grammatical standards of Classical Arabic and uses much of the same vocabulary. However, it has discarded some grammatical constructions and vocabulary that no longer have any counterpart in the spoken varieties and has adopted certain new constructions and vocabulary from the spoken varieties. Much of the new vocabulary
7182-810: The Beka'a and main depot for the local grain harvest. Some of the factors for the expansion included the Egyptian Occupation (1831–41), which lead to the opening of the country to European trade, the Crimean War which had caused grain shortages in Europe and the expansion of silk production in Mount Lebanon. Besides controlling the grain trade , Zahlé became a centre for livestock from the region of Syria and produced leather, woven and dyed goods, trading with Aleppo , Damascus and Beirut . By
7315-519: The Town Hall . In the past, the ground floor used to house the local prison, which suffered of severe overcrowding and substandard conditions. The prison was transferred in 2009 to a new location in Muallaqa, with room for about 800 inmates and much more adequate infrastructure. This grandiose complex dates back to 1720, and consists of a series of stone-clad buildings around a large inner courtyard:
7448-565: The U.S. Department of Agriculture 's natural resources inventory , urban areas are officially known as developed areas or urban and built-up areas. Such areas include cities, ethnic villages, other built-up areas of more than 10 ac (4 ha), industrial sites, railroad yards, cemeteries, airports, golf courses, shooting ranges, institutional and public administration sites, and similar areas. The 1997 national resources inventory placed over 98,000,000 ac (40,000,000 ha) in this category, an increase of 25,000,000 ac (10,000,000 ha) since 1982. Argentina
7581-419: The United States , Canada , Brazil , Mexico , Argentina , Chile , Japan and Australia and many other countries where the urbanization rate is over 80%. Unlike an urban area, a metropolitan area includes not only the urban area, but also satellite cities plus intervening rural land that is socio-economically connected to the urban core city, typically by employment ties through commuting , with
7714-568: The Xth form , or جامعة jāmiʻah 'university', based on جمع jamaʻa 'to gather, unite'; جمهورية jumhūriyyah 'republic', based on جمهور jumhūr 'multitude'). An earlier tendency was to redefine an older word although this has fallen into disuse (e.g., هاتف hātif 'telephone' < 'invisible caller (in Sufism)'; جريدة jarīdah 'newspaper' < 'palm-leaf stalk'). Colloquial or dialectal Arabic refers to
7847-494: The northern Hejaz . These features are evidence of common descent from a hypothetical ancestor , Proto-Arabic . The following features of Proto-Arabic can be reconstructed with confidence: On the other hand, several Arabic varieties are closer to other Semitic languages and maintain features not found in Classical Arabic, indicating that these varieties cannot have developed from Classical Arabic. Thus, Arabic vernaculars do not descend from Classical Arabic: Classical Arabic
7980-419: The "learned" tradition (Classical Arabic). This variety and both its classicizing and "lay" iterations have been termed Middle Arabic in the past, but they are thought to continue an Old Higazi register. It is clear that the orthography of the Quran was not developed for the standardized form of Classical Arabic; rather, it shows the attempt on the part of writers to record an archaic form of Old Higazi. In
8113-842: The "purest," most eloquent form of Arabic—initiating a process of jamʿu‿l-luɣah ( جمع اللغة 'compiling the language') which took place over the 8th and early 9th centuries. Kitāb al-'Ayn ( c. 8th century ), attributed to Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi , is considered the first lexicon to include all Arabic roots ; it sought to exhaust all possible root permutations —later called taqālīb ( تقاليب ) — calling those that are actually used mustaʿmal ( مستعمَل ) and those that are not used muhmal ( مُهمَل ). Lisān al-ʿArab (1290) by Ibn Manzur gives 9,273 roots, while Tāj al-ʿArūs (1774) by Murtada az-Zabidi gives 11,978 roots. Urban area Urban areas originate through urbanization , and researchers categorize them as cities, towns, conurbations or suburbs . In urbanism ,
SECTION 60
#17327936807208246-454: The 11th and 12th centuries in al-Andalus , the zajal and muwashah poetry forms developed in the dialectical Arabic of Cordoba and the Maghreb. The Nahda was a cultural and especially literary renaissance of the 19th century in which writers sought "to fuse Arabic and European forms of expression." According to James L. Gelvin , " Nahda writers attempted to simplify the Arabic language and script so that it might be accessible to
8379-556: The 1860's and 1870's the local merchants were prosperous but were still dependent on banks in Beirut for credit for their transactions. On 7 September 1975, during the civil war , the Lebanese Forces militia, at that time led by Elie Hobeika agreed to 100 Syrian soldiers and 20 intelligence officers taking up strategic positions in the town. The current population is not accurately known, since no census has been conducted in Lebanon since 1932, but estimates from 2017 are of
8512-571: The 4th to the 6th centuries, the Nabataean script evolved into the Arabic script recognizable from the early Islamic era. There are inscriptions in an undotted, 17-letter Arabic script dating to the 6th century CE, found at four locations in Syria ( Zabad , Jebel Usays , Harran , Umm el-Jimal ). The oldest surviving papyrus in Arabic dates to 643 CE, and it uses dots to produce the modern 28-letter Arabic alphabet. The language of that papyrus and of
8645-834: The 8th century, knowledge of Classical Arabic had become an essential prerequisite for rising into the higher classes throughout the Islamic world, both for Muslims and non-Muslims. For example, Maimonides , the Andalusi Jewish philosopher, authored works in Judeo-Arabic —Arabic written in Hebrew script . Ibn Jinni of Mosul , a pioneer in phonology , wrote prolifically in the 10th century on Arabic morphology and phonology in works such as Kitāb Al-Munṣif , Kitāb Al-Muḥtasab , and Kitāb Al-Khaṣāʾiṣ [ ar ] . Ibn Mada' of Cordoba (1116–1196) realized
8778-662: The Beirut- Damascus road, and lies at the junction of Mount Lebanon and the Beqaa Valley , at a mean elevation of 1,000 m. Established in the 18th century by Christians , Zahlé maintains its predominantly Greek Catholic character. The city enjoys convenient accessibility via road and rail, historically leveraging its strategic location as a trade hub. Zahlé is known as the "Bride of the Beqaa" and "the Neighbor of
8911-489: The Beirut-Damascus road, which passes to the southwest of the urban area. The journey can take anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours, depending on the traffic. Damascus , Syria, is 73 km (45 mi) to the southeast, and is normally reached within one-and-a-half hours, excluding the waiting time at the border. Despite continuously undergoing works and repairs, the Beirut-Damascus road remains in poor condition, and
9044-560: The Beqaa region in Zahlé, including the Central Bank of Lebanon and the Lebanese Chamber of Commerce . Zahlé is evolving into a regional center of higher education, after many universities have opened branches there in recent years. Institutes of higher education currently represented in the town include: Zahlé is connected to Beirut (55 kilometres (34 mi) to the west), and from there to all coastal cities, through
9177-411: The French withdrawal. The Christian population of Zahlé has the following approximate composition: Only two Muslim families remained inside Zahlé during the civil war: Hindi and Zrein. Zahlé's Muslim minority (around 27% of the population) is concentrated in the neighborhoods of Karak Nuh (where Noah's tomb is allegedly located) and Haoush al-Umara, specifically, in an area named "Hay al-watani", on
9310-523: The Gorge" for its geographical location and attractiveness, but also as "the City of Wine and Poetry". It is famous throughout Lebanon and the region for its pleasant climate, numerous riverside restaurants and quality arak . Its inhabitants are predominantly Melkite Greek Catholic and are known in Arabic as Zahlawi . The source of the city's name is unclear, some historian relate it to the ancient Roman god of fertility - Zohal. Evidence of Roman presence are
9443-412: The Middle East and North Africa have become a badge of sophistication and modernity and ... feigning, or asserting, weakness or lack of facility in Arabic is sometimes paraded as a sign of status, class, and perversely, even education through a mélange of code-switching practises." Arabic has been taught worldwide in many elementary and secondary schools, especially Muslim schools. Universities around
9576-663: The North American urban area) and its commuter belt ( couronne ). Americans would find the INSEE definition of the urban area to be similar to their metropolitan area . The largest cities in France, in terms of urban area population (2017), are Paris (12,628,266), Lyon (2,323,221), Marseille (1,760,653), Toulouse (1,360,829), Bordeaux (1,247,977), Lille (1,191,117), Nice (1,006,201), Nantes (972,828), Strasbourg (790,087) and Rennes (733,320). Germany has
9709-672: The Northern and Western ones. Urban areas in Sweden ( tätorter ) are statistically defined localities, totally independent of the administrative subdivision of the country. There are 1,956 such localities in Sweden , with a population ranging from 200 to 1,372,000 inhabitants. In 2013 the United Kingdom 's Office for National Statistics (ONS) published 2011 Built-up Areas – Methodology and Guidance which sets out its definition of
9842-617: The Philippine population lived in urban areas. With an estimated population of 16.3 million, Metro Manila is the most populous metropolitan area in the Philippines and the 11th in the world . However, the greater urban area is the 5th largest in the world with a population of 20,654,307 people (2010 estimate). As an island city-state , about 5.6 million people live and work within 700 square kilometres (270 sq mi). With 64 islands and islets , Singapore Island makes up
9975-690: The Qur'an is referred to by linguists as "Quranic Arabic", as distinct from its codification soon thereafter into " Classical Arabic ". In late pre-Islamic times, a transdialectal and transcommunal variety of Arabic emerged in the Hejaz , which continued living its parallel life after literary Arabic had been institutionally standardized in the 2nd and 3rd century of the Hijra , most strongly in Judeo-Christian texts, keeping alive ancient features eliminated from
10108-576: The Romance languages. Also, while it is comprehensible to people from the Maghreb , a linguistically innovative variety such as Moroccan Arabic is essentially incomprehensible to Arabs from the Mashriq , much as French is incomprehensible to Spanish or Italian speakers but relatively easily learned by them. This suggests that the spoken varieties may linguistically be considered separate languages. With
10241-407: The U.S. are those of Los Angeles , Chicago , Miami , Houston , and Dallas . 80.0 percent of the population of the United States lives within the boundaries of an urban area as of the 2020 census. The concept of Urbanized Areas as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau is often used as a more accurate gauge of the size of a city, since in different cities and states the lines between city borders and
10374-414: The United States are countries where the urbanization rate is between 80% and 90%. There are two measures of the degree of urbanization of a population. The first, urban population, describes the percentage of the total population living in urban areas, as defined by the country. The second measure, rate of urbanization, describes the projected average rate of change of the size of the urban population over
10507-565: The United States in the 1950 census, while urban clusters were added in the 2000 census. The distinction between urbanized areas and urban clusters was removed for the 2020 census. Urban areas consist of a densely-settled urban core, plus surrounding developed areas that meet certain density criteria. Since urban areas are composed of census blocks and not cities, counties, or county-equivalents, urban area boundaries may consist of partial areas of these political units. Urban areas are distinguished from rural areas : any area not part of an urban area
10640-402: The boundaries of these towns. This distinction may give a misleading impression in some cases, since some localities with only village status may have acquired larger and denser populations than many many smaller towns with most excessive example of Poznań , most spread urban area of the country with population of the city app. 534 thousand and metropolitan area around 1 million inhabitants. On
10773-568: The capital and largest city of Russia , has a population estimated at 12.4 million residents within the city limits, while over 17 million residents in the urban area, and over 20 million residents in the Moscow Metropolitan Area . It is among the world's largest cities , being the most populous city entirely within Europe , the most populous urban area in Europe, the most populous metropolitan area in Europe, and also
10906-509: The central avenue at rather irregular times. Interurban transportation is done by minivans, which stop on the Manara roundabout at the town's entrance. Zahlé's railway station was located in Muallaqa, but was abandoned after all rail transport in Lebanon stopped during the civil war. There were plans to convert the nearby Rayak Air Base (located 10 km (6 mi) to the East of Zahlé), into
11039-518: The church itself (which is the oldest part), the seat of the Archbishop (a converted former monastery), and a small chapel housing an icon, which is said to be a reproduction of a portrait of the Virgin Mary by Saint Lucas. It also features a monumental entrance, an underground cemetery, and a 40-metre-high (130 ft) bell tower, atop of which a large marble clock was mounted in 1993. Part of
11172-564: The civil war in the 1970s and 1980s, a new flow of migrants left the town for the United States, Canada, Australia and Brazil. In recent years, emigration has continued, with Canada and the United Arab Emirates being the main destinations. Today, an estimated 250,000 people of local descent live abroad, most of them in Colombia and Brazil. Being the main town of the Beqaa Valley , Lebanon's most important agricultural region,
11305-522: The complex was destroyed by a bomb attack in April 1987, and rebuilt ever since. The grand Hotel Kadri is a prime example of the traditional stone architecture of Zahlé, both in and out. It has long been used by most officials and dignitaries visiting the town, as its largest and most luxurious hotel. The Ottomans converted it to a hospital during World War I . During the Lebanese Civil War, it
11438-574: The conversion of Semitic mimation to nunation in the singular. It is best reassessed as a separate language on the Central Semitic dialect continuum. It was also thought that Old Arabic coexisted alongside—and then gradually displaced— epigraphic Ancient North Arabian (ANA), which was theorized to have been the regional tongue for many centuries. ANA, despite its name, was considered a very distinct language, and mutually unintelligible, from "Arabic". Scholars named its variant dialects after
11571-426: The distance between each building has to be of less than 50 m, although exceptions are made due to parks, industrial areas, rivers, and similar. Groups of houses less than 400 m from the main body of an urban area are included in the urban area. In Poland , official "urban" population figures simply refer to those localities which have the status of towns ( miasta ). The "rural" population is that of all areas outside
11704-521: The dynasty was closely allied to the Orthodox Ma'luf family of Zahlé (where Mustafa Harfush took refuge some years later) and showing that depredations from various quarters as well as Zahlé's growing commercial attractiveness accounted for Baalbek's decline in the 18th century. What repression there was did not always target the Christian community per se. The Shiite 'Usayran family, for example,
11837-424: The economy of Zahlé has long been built on agriculture. Grapes are the area's chief product, with vineyards forming a prominent feature of the surrounding landscape. Vines are also individually grown on lattice, on many of the older houses' terraces. A sizable part of the local produce supplies the three wineries present in and around the town, and the numerous distilleries producing arak , the local liquor which Zahlé
11970-587: The emergence of Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include: There are several features which Classical Arabic, the modern Arabic varieties, as well as the Safaitic and Hismaic inscriptions share which are unattested in any other Central Semitic language variety, including the Dadanitic and Taymanitic languages of
12103-728: The eve of the conquests: Northern and Central (Al-Jallad 2009). The modern dialects emerged from a new contact situation produced following the conquests. Instead of the emergence of a single or multiple koines, the dialects contain several sedimentary layers of borrowed and areal features, which they absorbed at different points in their linguistic histories. According to Veersteegh and Bickerton, colloquial Arabic dialects arose from pidginized Arabic formed from contact between Arabs and conquered peoples. Pidginization and subsequent creolization among Arabs and arabized peoples could explain relative morphological and phonological simplicity of vernacular Arabic compared to Classical and MSA. In around
12236-563: The extent of irreversible urban development indicated on Ordnance Survey maps. The definition is an extent of at least 20 ha and at least 1,500 census residents. Separate areas are linked if less than 200 m (220 yd) apart. Included are transportation features. The UK has five Urban Areas with a population over a million and a further sixty nine with a population over one hundred thousand . The Australian Bureau of Statistics refers to urban areas as Urban Centres, which it generally defines as population clusters of 1,000 or more people. Australia
12369-607: The fact that they participate in the innovations common to all forms of Arabic. The earliest attestation of continuous Arabic text in an ancestor of the modern Arabic script are three lines of poetry by a man named Garm(')allāhe found in En Avdat, Israel , and dated to around 125 CE. This is followed by the Namara inscription , an epitaph of the Lakhmid king Imru' al-Qays bar 'Amro, dating to 328 CE, found at Namaraa, Syria. From
12502-629: The first Thursday of June with a large-scale procession, with a torch-lit parade being held on the previous evening. The Corpus Christi celebration dates back to 1825, when the town was spared the ravages of bubonic plague . Zahlé has a Mediterranean climate ( Köppen climate classification : Csa ) with continental influences. Zahlé is twinned with: Arabic language Arabic (endonym: اَلْعَرَبِيَّةُ , romanized : al-ʿarabiyyah , pronounced [al ʕaraˈbijːa] , or عَرَبِيّ , ʿarabīy , pronounced [ˈʕarabiː] or [ʕaraˈbij] )
12635-510: The fourth most useful language for business, after English, Mandarin Chinese , and French. Arabic is written with the Arabic alphabet , an abjad script that is written from right to left . Arabic is usually classified as a Central Semitic language . Linguists still differ as to the best classification of Semitic language sub-groups. The Semitic languages changed between Proto-Semitic and
12768-650: The given period of time. According to Urbanization by sovereign state article, the world as a whole is 56.2% urbanized, with roughly one-quarter of the countries reported as greater than 80% urbanized. Data is taken from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency World Factbook estimates from 2020. According to Demographia, these are the 202 largest urban areas in the world by population (as of 2023): The UN publishes data on cities, urban areas and rural areas, but relies almost entirely on national definitions of these areas. The UN principles and recommendations state that due to different characteristics of urban and rural areas across
12901-584: The global urban population comprised 3.9 billion. The Population Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs at that time predicted the urban population would occupy 68% of the world population by 2050, with 90% of that growth coming from Africa and Asia. Urban areas are created and further developed by the process of urbanization. They are measured for various purposes, including analyzing population density and urban sprawl . Urban areas are also mostly found in
13034-403: The globe, a global definition is not possible. European countries define urbanized areas on the basis of urban-type land use , not allowing any gaps of typically more than 200 metres (220 yd), and use satellite imagery instead of census blocks to determine the boundaries of the urban area. In less-developed countries , in addition to land use and density requirements, a requirement that
13167-597: The inclusion of new words into their published standard dictionaries. They also publish old and historical Arabic manuscripts. In 1997, a bureau of Arabization standardization was added to the Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization of the Arab League . These academies and organizations have worked toward the Arabization of the sciences, creating terms in Arabic to describe new concepts, toward
13300-494: The land area is counted. The Randstad is the country's largest conurbation located in the west of the country and contains the four largest cities: Amsterdam, Rotterdam , The Hague , and Utrecht . The Randstad has a population of 7 million inhabitants and is the 6th largest metropolitan area in Europe. Norway defines urban areas ("tettsteder") similarly to the other Nordic countries . Unlike in Denmark and Sweden,
13433-613: The language. Software and books with tapes are an important part of Arabic learning, as many of Arabic learners may live in places where there are no academic or Arabic language school classes available. Radio series of Arabic language classes are also provided from some radio stations. A number of websites on the Internet provide online classes for all levels as a means of distance education; most teach Modern Standard Arabic, but some teach regional varieties from numerous countries. The tradition of Arabic lexicography extended for about
13566-525: The largest city by land area on the European continent. Saint Petersburg , the cultural capital, is the second-largest city, with a population of roughly 5.4 million inhabitants. Other major urban areas are Yekaterinburg , Novosibirsk , Kazan , Nizhny Novgorod , and Chelyabinsk . Spain is a very highly urbanized country. Madrid is its largest urban area. The Southern and Eastern coasts with Barcelona , Valencia and Málaga are more urbanised than
13699-513: The largest natural Christmas tree. Zahlé in itself offers little archaeological interest; however, the Château Ksara winery is worth a visit for its maze of vaults which dates back to Roman times. The suburb of Karak Nuh also features a curiosity: a 40-metre-long (131 ft) stone structure inside the local mosque, which local tradition believes to be the Tomb of Noah (but is probably
13832-495: The largest number of Catholics . While several Middle Eastern cities (including Damascus , Cairo and Amman ) have larger Christian communities, these do not constitute a majority. In Lebanon, Beirut also has a larger Christian population than Zahlé (in the city proper), but most of this population belongs to the Greek Orthodox confession. Jounieh is also bigger than Zahlé, and was also overwhelmingly Christian before
13965-617: The largest urban area in the country. According to the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific , the country has the highest urbanised population in Southeast Asia, with 100 percent of its population living in an urban area. The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) is responsible for the urban land-use planning, which designates land use and urban density of the country. The country
14098-604: The late 6th century AD, a relatively uniform intertribal "poetic koine" distinct from the spoken vernaculars developed based on the Bedouin dialects of Najd , probably in connection with the court of al-Ḥīra . During the first Islamic century, the majority of Arabic poets and Arabic-writing persons spoke Arabic as their mother tongue. Their texts, although mainly preserved in far later manuscripts, contain traces of non-standardized Classical Arabic elements in morphology and syntax. Abu al-Aswad al-Du'ali ( c. 603 –689)
14231-420: The latter is taught in formal education settings. However, there have been studies reporting some degree of comprehension of stories told in the standard variety among preschool-aged children. The relation between Modern Standard Arabic and these dialects is sometimes compared to that of Classical Latin and Vulgar Latin vernaculars (which became Romance languages ) in medieval and early modern Europe. MSA
14364-422: The major cities, returning home to the countryside periodically with their earnings. China has more cities with one million or more long-term residents than any other country, including the three global cities of Beijing , Hong Kong, and Shanghai ; by 2025, the country will be home to 221 cities with over a million inhabitants. The figures in the table below are from the 2008 census, and are only estimates of
14497-883: The many national or regional varieties which constitute the everyday spoken language. Colloquial Arabic has many regional variants; geographically distant varieties usually differ enough to be mutually unintelligible , and some linguists consider them distinct languages. However, research indicates a high degree of mutual intelligibility between closely related Arabic variants for native speakers listening to words, sentences, and texts; and between more distantly related dialects in interactional situations. The varieties are typically unwritten. They are often used in informal spoken media, such as soap operas and talk shows , as well as occasionally in certain forms of written media such as poetry and printed advertising. Hassaniya Arabic , Maltese , and Cypriot Arabic are only varieties of modern Arabic to have acquired official recognition. Hassaniya
14630-543: The most urbanised nation in South Asia. Furthermore, 50% of Pakistanis live in towns of 5,000 people or more. Karachi is the most populated city in Pakistan closely followed by Lahore according to the 2017 Census . In Bangladesh , there are total 532 urban areas, which are divided into three categories. Those are City Corporation , Municipal Corporation (Pourasova) and Upazila town . Among those urban areas, Dhaka
14763-782: The need for a lexical injection in Arabic, to suit concepts of the industrial and post-industrial age (such as sayyārah سَيَّارَة 'automobile' or bākhirah باخِرة 'steamship'). In response, a number of Arabic academies modeled after the Académie française were established with the aim of developing standardized additions to the Arabic lexicon to suit these transformations, first in Damascus (1919), then in Cairo (1932), Baghdad (1948), Rabat (1960), Amman (1977), Khartum [ ar ] (1993), and Tunis (1993). They review language development, monitor new words and approve
14896-437: The new term " population centre "; the new term was chosen in order to better reflect the fact that urban vs. rural is not a strict division, but rather a continuum within which several distinct settlement patterns may exist. For example, a community may fit a strictly statistical definition of an urban area, but may not be commonly thought of as "urban" because it has a smaller population, or functions socially and economically as
15029-553: The northeastern and southwestern edge of town, respectively. Sixty-two percent of Muslims in the area are Shia , while the remaining 38% are Sunnis . In the past the town also had a Druze minority and even a small Jewish population, most of which, however, emigrated during the Lebanese Civil War . Zahlé has been a land of emigration since the early 20th century, with most people emigrating to South America, mainly Colombia , Venezuela , Brazil and Argentina . During
15162-409: The number living in rural areas (3.41 billion), and since then the world has become more urban than rural. This was the first time that the majority of the world's population lived in a city. By that time a high estimate calculated up to 3.5 million square kilometers of land were urban, estimates ranging from 1% of global land area. In 2014 there were 7.3 billion people living on the planet, of which
15295-424: The one whose sound is heard but whose person remains unseen. Now the term al-hatif is used for a telephone. Therefore, the process of tawleed can express the needs of modern civilization in a manner that would appear to be originally Arabic. In the case of Arabic, educated Arabs of any nationality can be assumed to speak both their school-taught Standard Arabic as well as their native dialects, which depending on
15428-530: The other hand, the Katowice urban area with numerous large and medium cities covers 1,468 km and has above 2 million people. The metropolitan areas in Poland are the biggest urban zones (e.g. Katowice metropolitan area , Łódź metropolitan area and Szczecin metropolitan area ) and have great impact on the rural surroundings, as it is around Lublin , Radom , Kielce , Tarnów and Białystok . Moscow ,
15561-549: The overhaul of Arabic grammar first proposed by Al-Jahiz 200 years prior. The Maghrebi lexicographer Ibn Manzur compiled Lisān al-ʿArab ( لسان العرب , "Tongue of Arabs"), a major reference dictionary of Arabic, in 1290. Charles Ferguson 's koine theory claims that the modern Arabic dialects collectively descend from a single military koine that sprang up during the Islamic conquests; this view has been challenged in recent times. Ahmad al-Jallad proposes that there were at least two considerably distinct types of Arabic on
15694-403: The ravine. Located on a hilltop to the southwest of Zahlé, this is a 54-metre-high (177 ft) concrete tower, entirely clad in white marble, and topped with a 10-metre-tall (33 ft) bronze statue of the Virgin Mary, the work of an Italian artist. It is by far Zahlé's most prominent structure—visible from most of the city and from several miles around in the central Bekaa Valley. At its base
15827-410: The region may be mutually unintelligible. Some of these dialects can be considered to constitute separate languages which may have "sub-dialects" of their own. When educated Arabs of different dialects engage in conversation (for example, a Moroccan speaking with a Lebanese), many speakers code-switch back and forth between the dialectal and standard varieties of the language, sometimes even within
15960-477: The ruins found. Others claim the derives from the occasional landslides that take place on deforested hills around the town are probably at the origin of the name. There has been human activity in the area for at least five thousand years. In the 18th century, Zahlé was a small village of some 200 houses. Its relative geographic isolation from the local centres of power in Mount Lebanon and Syria caused
16093-458: The same sentence. The issue of whether Arabic is one language or many languages is politically charged, in the same way it is for the varieties of Chinese , Hindi and Urdu , Serbian and Croatian , Scots and English, etc. In contrast to speakers of Hindi and Urdu who claim they cannot understand each other even when they can, speakers of the varieties of Arabic will claim they can all understand each other even when they cannot. While there
16226-458: The sole example of Medieval linguist Abu Hayyan al-Gharnati – who, while a scholar of the Arabic language, was not ethnically Arab – Medieval scholars of the Arabic language made no efforts at studying comparative linguistics, considering all other languages inferior. In modern times, the educated upper classes in the Arab world have taken a nearly opposite view. Yasir Suleiman wrote in 2011 that "studying and knowing English or French in most of
16359-563: The standardization of these new terms throughout the Arabic-speaking world, and toward the development of Arabic as a world language . This gave rise to what Western scholars call Modern Standard Arabic. From the 1950s, Arabization became a postcolonial nationalist policy in countries such as Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Sudan. Arabic usually refers to Standard Arabic, which Western linguists divide into Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic. It could also refer to any of
16492-475: The term "urban area" contrasts to rural areas such as villages and hamlets ; in urban sociology or urban anthropology it contrasts with natural environment . The development of earlier predecessors of modern urban areas during the urban revolution of the 4th millennium BCE led to the formation of human civilization and ultimately to modern urban planning , which along with other human activities such as exploitation of natural resources has led to
16625-571: The time of independence and has several different causes. The majority of southern Pakistan's population lives along the Indus River . Karachi is its most populous city. In the northern half of the country, most of the population lives in an arc formed by the cities of Lahore , Faisalabad , Rawalpindi , Islamabad , Gujranwala , Sialkot , Gujrat , Jhelum , Sargodha , Sheikhupura , Nowshera , Mardan and Peshawar . During 1990–2008, city dwellers made up 36% of Pakistan's population, making it
16758-406: The town's main avenue. The other central aspect of the local culture is religious devotion. Zahlé is still a very Catholic and conservative town, and many of its inhabitants display a pride with their religious identity. Prophet Elias (Elijah) is the town's patron saint , whose feast on July 20 is traditionally celebrated with fireworks. Another notable holiday is Corpus-Christi, celebrated on
16891-501: The towns where the inscriptions were discovered (Dadanitic, Taymanitic, Hismaic, Safaitic). However, most arguments for a single ANA language or language family were based on the shape of the definite article, a prefixed h-. It has been argued that the h- is an archaism and not a shared innovation, and thus unsuitable for language classification, rendering the hypothesis of an ANA language family untenable. Safaitic and Hismaic, previously considered ANA, should be considered Old Arabic due to
17024-495: The urban core city being the primary labor market. The concept of an "urban area" as used in economic statistics should not be confused with the concept of the "urban area" used in road safety statistics. This term was first created by Geographer Brian Manning. The last concept is also known as " built-up area in road safety ". According to the definition by the Office for National Statistics , "Built-up areas are defined as land which
17157-492: The urban populations within administrative city limits; a different ranking exists when considering the total municipal populations (which includes suburban and rural populations). The large " floating populations " of migrant workers make conducting censuses in urban areas difficult; the figures below include only long-term residents. In Japan , urbanized areas are defined as contiguous areas of densely inhabited districts (DIDs) using census enumeration districts as units with
17290-474: The urbanized area of that city are often not the same. For example, the city of Greenville, South Carolina has a city population just over 68,000 and an urbanized area population of around 400,000, while Greensboro, North Carolina has a city population just over 285,000 and an urbanized area population of around 300,000 — meaning that Greenville is actually "larger" for some intents and purposes, but not for others, such as taxation, local elections, etc. In
17423-533: The village not to have any significant allies in the region to fall back on in case of conflicts or attacks. Zahlé was burned in 1777 and 1791. Tradition holds that many Christians migrated from the Baalbek region in the 18th century to the newer, more secure town of Zahlé on account of the Harfush dynasty 's oppression and rapacity, but more critical studies have questioned that interpretation by pointing out that
17556-451: The world have classes that teach Arabic as part of their foreign languages , Middle Eastern studies , and religious studies courses. Arabic language schools exist to assist students to learn Arabic outside the academic world. There are many Arabic language schools in the Arab world and other Muslim countries. Because the Quran is written in Arabic and all Islamic terms are in Arabic, millions of Muslims (both Arab and non-Arab) study
17689-564: Was occupied by Syrian troops and sustained enormous damage. An ambitious restoration project in the mid-1990s was able to bring it back to its former glory. The hotel closed in February 2011 due to a conflict between its direction and the Catholic Church (its effective owner since 1999) and reopened later in 2013. Situated across the street from Grand Hotel Kadri, Memshieh is Zahlé's oldest and shadiest park (newly opened J.T.Skaff Park
#719280