OT - Size of medieval capitals

[narf poit chez BOOM]

I'm looking for the diameter, in miles, of medieval capitals at their height, but before the renesaunce.

I probably mispelled the re-word horribly.

I've tried looking Online, but while I can find maps the writing is really tiny and they don't seem to have distances marked.

[Fyron]

Well, they tended to have a whopping population of 17,000 or less... so not very big at all.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Sorry, but I can't really visualize a mile as distance, so...

I'm making a capital in a fantasy world and I need to know about how big it would be.

[Fyron]

Depends on whether you want it to be a dark ages city or what...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Well, a sewage system, not intricate but extending through all the city, cobblestone roads througout much of the city, except the more dangerous and/or poorer parts, it's a seaport and a trade center. That help?

[Aiken]

I have some numbers, but they are too rough:
Square: typical - 50-60 hectares, capital/trade center like Paris, Venice - 300-500 hectares.
Height of buildings: up to 25 meters.

Edit: that's for XV century.

[ May 19, 2004, 01:02: Message edited by: aiken ]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Thanks. Uh, how many hectares in a mile? I couldn't find a good Online conVersion.

[Fyron]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hectare

[narf poit chez BOOM]

In other words, the typical medieval capital would take only an hour or two to walk accross?

That sounds to small. Anyway, gotta go.

[ May 19, 2004, 01:11: Message edited by: narf poit chez BOOM ]

[Fyron]

Well the largest city in western Europe during the dark ages was around 17,000 people... that is not very big at all.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Hmm...what I'm looking at, then, for the type of setting I want is 8 sq.miles, 2,070 hectares and about 100,000 people.

Which isn't a dark age city. What kind of city might it corrospond to? Just in case my mental image is way off.

[tesco samoa]

well then your looking at a city that was located in middle east.... Current country is turkey... Or pick some of the big cities from China or India. They would at the 100 k during the dark ages...

Istanbal was 100k back then...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

So, what level of organization would be nessasary for a 100k city?

I'm thinking, a duke just for the city, a council of lower nobles, a merchants/guild council of some sort, the obligatory wizard's guild, since this is a fantasy world, a guard organized around the city's sections, the nobles and rich merchants would no doubt hire additional guards for their section. And the duke would have his own guard, commanded, no doubt, by a minor noble. And, since this is the capital, the king would have his guard and the army.

I'm using European terms because I'm familiar with them, but if this city is more believable as a middle-easternish city, if someone would provide titles and a breakdown...

[Roanon]

100k is a lot. If you want a believable city of that size, first of all make sure they can get food and fresh water in sufficient quantities from somewhere http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif . Farming was not very effective these days, and many of the bigger roman cities had to use aquaducts to carry water to the cities over long distances.
Supply was one of the biggest problems in these times, apart from the danger of diseases due to non-existing sewer systems - despite the romans having it, the knowledge had been lost in these times. But in a fantasy world you don't have an oppressive knowlegde-killing christian church, so this does not have to be an issue http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif .

Command structures, guilds, orders of chivalry and nobility are pretty much arbitrary - wheater a general commands 50 people or 50k depends on the size of the army he is serving in, not his rank. I suggest using any good roleplaying sourcebook detailling a city structure, saves a lot of work. And embarrassment when someone finds out that 96% of the cities' population are nobles or soldiers and no one is doing the actual work there http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

[ May 19, 2004, 02:31: Message edited by: Roanon ]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Answer in ()
Originally posted by Roanon:
100k is a lot. If you want a believable city of that size, first of all make sure they can get food and fresh water in sufficient quantities from somewhere http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif . Farming was not very effective these days, and many of the bigger roman cities had to use aquaducts to carry water to the cities over long distances.

(Ok, Aqueducts, check, three. And I've renovated the docks to specifically cover the waterfront, it's a large bay. That and roman-quality roads, at least in the vicinity of the capital, should cover it.)

Supply was one of the biggest problems in these times, apart from the danger of diseases due to non-existing sewer systems - despite the romans having it, the knowledge had been lost in these times. But in a fantasy world you don't have an oppressive knowlegde-killing christian church, so this does not have to be an issue http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif .

(There is a sewar system, although it's not a marvel of engeneering.)

Command structures, guilds, orders of chivalry and nobility are pretty much arbitrary - wheater a general commands 50 people or 50k depends on the size of the army he is serving in, not his rank. I suggest using any good roleplaying sourcebook detailling a city structure, saves a lot of work. And embarrassment when someone finds out that 96% of the cities' population are nobles or soldiers and no one is doing the actual work there http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

(I think I will associate military ranks with soldiers commanded. It's not historical, but it keeps things simpler for me and isn't a big issure.)
<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Would the D&D Dungeon masters guide be good enough, or if not, can you point me to a good one?

[ May 19, 2004, 02:42: Message edited by: narf poit chez BOOM ]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

ok, I've made a map of the city. Not an amazing map, but for anyone who wants to take a look at what I'm talking about...How do you put an image on a webpage?

And now, Smallville!

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Voila! (http://www3.telus.net/funnybnz/City.png)

[dogscoff]

, if you are looking for an easy tool to design maps, I am using campaign cartographer / city designer <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Hmm, that would have been good to know about before I went and made
this (http://www.dogscoff.co.uk/fiction/images/map_primavera.jpg).

Mind you, given that Primavera is over 100kn wide, a building-by-building map as shown in those screenshots might have been a bit ambitious...

[Roanon]

delete function still missing in this forum....

[ May 19, 2004, 14:45: Message edited by: Roanon ]

[Roanon]

Originally posted by Roanon:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by dogscoff:
[qb]Hmm, that would have been good to know about before I went and made
this (http://www.dogscoff.co.uk/fiction/images/map_primavera.jpg).
<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You should have asked http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif
Mind you, given that Primavera is over 100kn wide, a building-by-building map as shown in those screenshots might have been a bit ambitious... <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You'd be surprised. City Designer has excellent macroing and random placement features, plus it is very easy to place buildings auto-aligning near streets, copy whole blocks changing just a few features, and much more. Good output with little input. I would guess, for example, about 1-2 hours of work for a map like yours, everything (distance scaling, names, etc.) included. Add a few hours per quarter, and you have a detailled map with buildings...

[tesco samoa]

hey you should also check out world of darkness.. Vampire Dark Ages... They have some great maps of cities from that time.

As does the other series

[narf poit chez BOOM]

City designer doesn't have a demo Version and I don't have money to spare right now, so that's going to have to wait.

Thanks anyway.
In the meantime, I really should put roads in. Half the city's probably starving. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif

Thanks, all.
Originally posted by Roanon:
For pure design, if you are looking for an easy tool to design maps, I am using campaign cartographer / city designer from here (http://www.profantasy.com>Profantasy</a>.), here (search for keyword Taevar) (http://www.geocities.com/jdobritt/index2a.html>here</a>). I really love this programm, the maps look complicated and like a lot of work, but after taking a small learning curve its really very easy to use and create such maps. <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">

[ May 19, 2004, 21:12: Message edited by: narf poit chez BOOM ]

[Roanon]

Or just search their database or the webring, download a suitable map and pass it as your own http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

[minipol]

Well, the city i was born in was one of the biggest during the middelages (Bruges).
It counted between 40.000 and 45.000 people between 1200 - 1400.
I don't know about the size of the city but it would have only taken you about an hour to walk from 1 side to another, maximum.

[Roanon]

For pure design, if you are looking for an easy tool to design maps, I am using campaign cartographer / city designer from here (http://www.profantasy.com>Profantasy</a>.), here (search for keyword Taevar) (http://www.geocities.com/jdobritt/index2a.html>here</a>). I really love this programm, the maps look complicated and like a lot of work, but after taking a small learning curve its really very easy to use and create such maps.

[Kamog]

It's amazing how much the world's population has grown over the Last few centuries! Those medieval capitals don't sound very big at all...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Originally posted by Roanon:
Or just search their database or the webring, download a suitable map and pass it as your own http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Aah...No. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif

[Puke]

Originally posted by narf poit chez BOOM:
In other words, the typical medieval capital would take only an hour or two to walk accross?

That sounds to small. Anyway, gotta go. <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I can walk across the significant (and some of the non-significant) parts of San Francisco in about an hour.

[Puke]

Originally posted by narf poit chez BOOM:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Originally posted by Roanon:
Or just search their database or the webring, download a suitable map and pass it as your own http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Aah...No. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">why not, you're not publishing the thing for money, people shared their designs with the intention of them being used.

and i dont think many, if any, western european cities had sewers. at least not enclosed ones.

[geoschmo]

Originally posted by Puke:
and i dont think many, if any, western european cities had sewers. at least not enclosed ones. <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Actually, many of the cities in the Roman Empire had fairly modern sewer systems, so it wouldn't be that suprising if those were still being used after the empire fell.

[Sefter Aruna]

You know as long as you are talking about that time period maybe you could help me get some pics. I need solders, all classes. Working on a mod for SEIV.

(To respond please go to "new mod idea!")

[ May 20, 2004, 18:35: Message edited by: Sefter Aruna ]

[Roanon]

The knwoledge about a good sewer system was lost in the dark age, as several other comforts that we consider to be modern.

Most sewer systems fell into disrepair some time after the fall of the Roman empire and were never repaired. Christian church and its inquisition ruled and nobody dared to be too modern or inventive. Letting the sewage flow freely into rivers and lakes was common, and middle-age citys usually radiated a penetrating stench so that you could smell any city before you could see it.

The contaminated water often caused mass diseases like cholera and thypus when a city grew too much, keeping the cities small. And it led to the (in these times partially correct) opinion that water was generally unhealty, leading to the noble's habit to use powder and perfume rather than washing with water.

[Fyron]

Originally posted by Kamog:
It's amazing how much the world's population has grown over the Last few centuries! Those medieval capitals don't sound very big at all... <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Rome (the city) was over 1 million at its height in the old days of the Empire. So was the capital of the Han dynasty in China. Many cities had populations in the 100 thousands during the height of various empires. The Dark Ages in Europe were a period of great decline, including population levels. Same with all the other Dark Ages throughout history. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif