100 Cities and Their Nicknames | Travel Away 100 Cities and Their Nicknames Last updated on 9 Feb 2016 | By Miruna Corneanu I like nicknames. They define us better than our names, they are clever and funny, and they tell so much about our personality and sometimes, about our aspect, although this might be the worst case. I’ve had plenty of nicknames from “Bal” and “Maimu” to “Blondy”, but now everyone calls me by using diminutives of my name. That’s why when someone calls me “Miruna”, I know there’s something wrong going on. I know the Internet is full of lists with cities’ nicknames, but I decided to make my own, composed of the world’s most important cities, and I hope this will be useful for my readers. 1. Paris – The City of Love, The City of Light, La Ville-Lumiere 2. Prague – The City of Hundred Spires, The Golden City, The Mother of Cities 3. New York – The Big Apple 4. Las Vegas – Sin City 5. Chicago – The Windy City 6.

Vancouver – The Big Smoke 7. Montreal – La Belle Ville, Frenchtown, The City-Mountain 8. Los Angeles – The City of Angels 9. New Orleans – The Big Easy 10. Philadelphia – City of Brotherly Love, Philly 11. Amsterdam – Venice of the North 12. Venice – La Serenissima, Bride of the Sea 13. Vienna – The Imperial City 14. London – The Square Mile, The Old Smoke, The Smoke 15. Detroit – Motor City 16. Miami – The Magic City, Little Cuba 17. Memphis – Bluff City 18. Petra – The Rose Red City 19. Pittsburgh – Iron City 20. Rome – The Eternal City, City of the Seven Hills 21. Seattle – The Emerald City 22. Bucharest – Little Paris 23. Florence – The City of Lilies 24. Barcelona – The City of Counts, The City of Gaudi 25. Budapest – Pearl of the Danube 26.

Toronto – Queen City, Muddy York, The Big Toe 27. Dublin – The Fair City 28. Jerusalem – The Holy City 29. Boston – The Hub 31. Moscow – The Whitestone, The Forty Forties, Third Rome 32. Edinburgh – Auld Reekie 33. Geneva – The Peace Capital 34. Rio de Janeiro – Marvelous City 35. Salzburg – White City 36. Mumbai – The City of Dreams 37. Singapore – The Lion City 38. Naples – City of the Sun 39. Bologna – Red City; La Dotta, La Rossa, La Grassa (the educated, the red, the fat) 40. Torino – City of Four Rivers 41. Genova – The Superb 43. Milano – Fashion Capital of the World, The Drinkable City 44. Cairo – Paris of the Nile 45. Buenos Aires – Paris of the Americas, Queen of the Plata 46. Ushuaia – The End of the World 47.

Melbourne – City by the Bay, Bleak City, Europe of Australia 48. Sydney – The Harbour City 50. Sao Paulo – Brazil’s Locomotive, Land of Drizzle, Sampa 51. Dubrovnik – The Pearl of the Adriatic 52. Helsinki – The White City of the North 53. Bordeaux – City of Wine 54. Nice – Angels City 55. Berlin – The Grey City 56. Jaipur – The Pink City 57. Oslo – Tiger Town 58. Warsaw – Default City, Big Village in the Middle of Nowhere 59. St Petersburg – The Mind of Russia 60. Madrid – El Foro, The Forum 61. Athens – The City of Violet Crown 62. Dallas – Big D 63. Hong Kong – Pearl of the Orient 64. Munich – World City with Heart 65. Birmingham – The City of a Thousand Trades, Brum 66. Lisbon – City With a Future 67. The Hague – City of Peace and Justice 68.

Calcutta – City of Palaces, City of Love, City of Joy 69. Beijing – The Forbidden City 70. Adelaide – City of Churches 71. Zagreb – Little Vienna 72. Bruges – Venice of the North 73. Marseille – Phocean City 74. Tel Aviv – The City that Never Stops 75. Bolzano – The Door to the Dolomites, The German One 76. Sanremo – The City of Dreams 77. Tivoli – City of Delights 78. Vicenza – City of Gold 79. Kuala Lumpur – Golden Triangle 80. Cuernavaca – The City of Eternal Spring 81. Tijuana – Television Capital of the World 82. Rotterdam – Manhattan upon Meuse 83. Lima – City of the Kings 84. Manila – City by the Bay 85. Porto – The Invincible City 86. Cadiz – The Little Silver Cup 87. Bilbao – El Bocho 88. Zurich – Little Big City 89.

Kiev – The Mother of Rus’ Cities 90. Honolulu – Sheltered Bay 92. Wroclaw – City of Hundred Bridges 93. Beirut – Paris of the Middle East 94. Udine – Capital of the Great War 95. Ancona – Doric City 96. Tehran – The City of 72 Nations 97. Bangalore – The City of Gardens 98. Leipzig – Bimbo Town 99. Split – The Diocletian’s City 100. Grenoble – Capital of the Alps Do you know other cities’ nicknames? Don't be selfish, share this with your friends You May Also Like BBC - History - British History in depth: The Rise of Edinburgh Print this page Small beginnings In 1707, at the time of the Act of Union, Edinburgh was a small capital city, little more than a single street running west to east down a defensive crag from the Castle to Holyrood Palace, with narrow lanes - or wynds - branching off on both sides, in a layout that resembled the bones of a fish.

An overcrowded population, numbering in the region of 35,000, was crammed into tenement dwellings, some many stories high, to make the best use of the limited space, with commercial premises at street level. A few miles to the north, was the port of Leith, a separate burgh devoted to trade and fishing, whose fortunes were tied to the capital, particularly through the supply of luxury goods from Europe and beyond. All around and easily viewed from the prominences of the city were the dairies and market gardens that provided Edinburgh's food, along with a scattering of mansion houses in a picturesque landscape. Social intimacy was a feature of community life in Edinburgh throughout the first half of the 18th century. The wealthy and the poor lived in close proximity with face-to-face relationships, often in the same tenements though on different levels; the first and second floors having the highest social cachet. They also frequented the same inns and alehouses, and the numerous clubs and societies that thrived in the 'Enlightenment'. Edinburgh embraced a wide spectrum of members from the educated artisan to the great aristocrat.

Despite the rigours of the climate, and the notoriously filthy state of the streets and wynds, much of the social and commercial life of the city was conducted out of doors, in the regular markets and in the communal promenading that occurred each day. The wealthy and the poor lived in close proximity with face-to-face relationships... Edinburgh had long supported the institutions of government, such as the law courts and the Church. In the last years of the independent Scottish parliament, another 'government' institution was created - the Bank of Scotland, founded in 1695 - which set in motion the development of Edinburgh as a financial centre. Educational establishments, notably the University, also shaped the 'professional' character of the city. Yet the fortunes of Edinburgh languished in the first half of the 18th century. The University, Edinburgh © The Act of Union took the Parliament, and many of the prosperous governing classes, south to London. The poorer elements of the population expanded, causing further problems of overcrowding and disease in the tightly hemmed-in spaces of the medieval old town.

Economic stagnation in Scotland as a whole also created an air of despondency, and political upheavals, such as the Porteous Riots of 1736 and the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745, were a cause of much concern. Top A New Town The New Town from Ramsay Gardens © Responding to these multiple problems, in an act of outstanding vision, the Town Council of Edinburgh, under the leadership of Provost George Drummond, announced an architectural competition to design a New Town for Edinburgh. First proposed in 1752, the intention was to create a new and spacious cityscape of wide, symmetrical street, terraced town-houses, specialised shopping facilities and open squares and gardens on a separate green-field site immediately to the north. The Old and New Towns were separated by a body of water known as the 'Nor Loch'. This was crossed by the construction of an artificial 'Mound' - using the excavated earth from the basements of new buildings - and was eventually drained to create Princes Street Gardens. The New Town project was designed to house the wealthy, and to attract back to Scotland the absentee noblemen who now lived in London.

These people, it was hoped, would spend their money in Scotland and support the kinds of luxury businesses and modern commerce that would bring much-needed prestige and prosperity to the capital city. It was a patriotic project, with the names of the streets and the squares chosen to celebrate the Union and the Hanoverian monarchy, as well as the culture of Scotland. It was also designed to reflect new aspirations, as Scotland - following the blue-print described by Adam Smith in his Wealth of Nations - sought to enter the modern market age. ...the New Town of Edinburgh was the largest planned city development in the world at that time... Built in several stages from the 1760s to the 1830s, the New Town of Edinburgh was the largest planned city development in the world at that time, and it proved an outstanding success in bringing commercial and cultural dynamism to the city. The demand for luxury products to furnish the new houses supported a range of fine shops on Princes Street. Carriage-makers flourished since the broad, straight streets were now able to support a more sophisticated wheeled traffic than was ever possible in the Old Town.

The Carron Iron Company near Falkirk - the largest business in Scotland - produced an array of fancy domestic iron wares for the New Town, including cast iron grates to designs by Robert Adam. All of these developments generated a significant surge in well-paid working class employment. There was a parallel demand for professional people, many of whom lived in the New Town. Top Athens of the North The Bank of Scotland © Other aspects of Edinburgh's economy flourished in response to public investment. The financial industry was an area of particular growth, as new banks came into existence to service the needs of government and the landed gentry, and increasingly to provide financial support for the developing industrial giants of the west of Scotland in cotton, coal, iron and eventually, by the mid-19th century, in engineering and ship building. Reflecting this growth, major bank buildings, dominated by the Bank of Scotland's new headquarters on the Mound, became prominent features of the cityscape. The importance of Edinburgh as a financial centre was further developed in the early 1800s with the founding of a number of insurance companies, in response to the growing market for life insurance.

Firms of stock brokers and investment managers were an established part of the scene by the 1820s, making Edinburgh the most important financial city in Britain outside London. The presence of large numbers of legal and educational institutions, in addition to generating significant buildings such as the new University, also gave rise to a series of magnificent libraries, reflecting the unique place of Edinburgh in the European Enlightenment. One of the most spectacular was the Library of the Writers to the Signet (solicitors), adjoining the High Courts in the Old Town. ...making Edinburgh the most important financial city in Britain outside London. Education, government and law spawned a massive printing and publishing industry, with some of the household names of British publishing being based in the city. Some of the greatest publications of the period - notably the Encyclopaedia Britannica - were first produced in Edinburgh. Interior of the Signet Library © Sir Walter Scott, a novelist of international renown and a lawyer by profession, was a central figure in the literary and legal milieu of early 19th-century Edinburgh. And inspired by the popularity of the Romantic movement, there was a major growth in European interest in Scotland as a tourist destination.

Large numbers of visitors now travelled to Edinburgh en route to the Highlands, and these included such famous figures as Mendelssohn, the composer, in the 1820s. By the late 18th century, Edinburgh already enjoyed a remarkable reputation as a city of intellectual brilliance and beautiful architecture. Many new public buildings were built at great expense in the Greek neo-classical style, giving rise to its sometimes being called the 'Athens of the North'. A series of fine churches, the Assembly Rooms in George Street, the Register House at the east end of Princes Street - a government building to house the public records of Scotland - and the Napoleonic War monuments on Calton Hill, were of a type that could rival the great buildings of any city in Europe. Top Separate lives The Customs House, Leith © There were several notable buildings associated with the advance of the medical profession and the unrivalled reputation of Edinburgh as a centre of medical education. The Old Town, though still overcrowded, benefited from the general buoyancy of Edinburgh, with new building projects at the Courts and Exchange.

There were also new traffic intersections, running north-south across the High Street to link the Mound with George lV Bridge, and further east at the Tron Church, linking another southern route to the new North Bridge and the road to Leith. The port of Leith was not left behind in this dash for growth. New quays were added to the harbour to accommodate the growing traffic, and there was a new customs house in the classical style. With a growing reputation as a seaside resort, the development of golf links and the building of numerous 'marine villas', Leith supported its own genteel society, focused on a new Assembly Rooms. Face-to-face relationships were gradually eroded by social exclusivity in the New Town... It was testimony to the prestige of Edinburgh that at the height of this 'golden age', in 1822, King George lV made his celebrated visit to the Scottish capital - the first British monarch to travel north to Scotland in over a century. The occasion was marked with great pomp and splendour with much of the ceremony - in full tartan regalia - organised by Sir Walter Scott as one of the leading lights of Scottish society.

By this stage, the people of Edinburgh were justly proud of their flourishing city, whose population had expanded to 138,000 in 1821. But gains in space, in amenity and beauty, with new luxury housing and conspicuous consumption for some was inevitably socially divisive. The Old Town and North Bridge © The rich and the poor lived increasingly separate lives. Face-to-face relationships were gradually eroded - by social exclusivity in the New Town, and by the increasingly indoor life of most of the higher classes. The professional and gentry families that dominated wealthy society now had few occasions for contact with the working class. The squalor of life for the poor in the overcrowded and disease-infested Old Town became increasingly marked. There were cholera outbreaks in the early 1830s, and such infamous outrages as the Burke and Hare murders of the 1820s - committed in order to supply medical students with anatomy subjects - gave a sinister edge to the 'douce' image of Edinburgh. Like all great cities, Edinburgh had become a place of contrasts - of good and bad, desirable and undesirable. This was the price that was inevitably paid for the rise and prosperity of the capital of Scotland.

City nicknames The human animal differs from the lesser primates in his passion for lists of "Ten Best". — H. Allen Smith City nicknames The following is my list of City Nicknames, started around 1993. I had collected suggestions from the rec.games.trivia newsgroup, and had heard someone on KGO (San Francisco's AM news-talk radio station) use the phrase "... 10,000 residents of The City, of complications from ...". So I appropriated that phrase "The City of Complications", as an exceptionally apt nickname for San Francisco, and went on to collect a few other names. When I had enough of them, I posted the list to that newsgroup. So far, I have only been able to re-locate the quiz version of my list, so I haven't actually merged all of the answers back into the list yet. This past year or two (2001-2002), I added a few from the "Isaac Asimov" quiz column in the newspaper, a Sunset Magazine article (which lists California as the "World Capital of Agricultural World Capitals"), and other sources. I also found two other lists on the web (URLs below).

I now keep this merged version in both ~landauer/lists/CityOf.html and the stories link in my Radio Weblog, . The one at ~landauer/CityOf_was.html is older. Other web locations that have some similar lists include: ~rksnow/mottos.htm is (today) the top Google result for City nicknames , with good reason. "COMMUNITY MOTTOS & NICKNAMES" looks like they've been actively collecting these for a lot longer than I have.

The Trivia asylum Most recent additions (8 February 2003): Albany, OR; Alpine, TX; Beaver, OK; Bemidji, MN; Brainerd, MN; Bristol, TN; Burlington, Iowa; Cody, WY; Douglas, WY; Frannie, WY; Gallup, NM; Granby, CO; Isleton, CA; Laramie, WY; Lowell, WY; Meeteetse, WY; New York (as "Never Sleeps"); Noxubee County, Alabama; Philadelphia, PA; Rockport, MA; Santa Rosa, NM; Sonora, CA; Sturgis, Michigan; Taxco, Mexico; Tijuana, Mexico; Westwood, CA.

My List of City Nicknames: City Nickname Aberdeen, Scotland The Granite City Akron, OH Rubber City Albany, Georgia Good Life City Albany, ORHome of the Timber Carnival Alexandria, Egypt Pearl of the Mediterranean Allentown, Pennsylvania Cement City Alpine, TXGateway to the Big Bend Annapolis, Maryland Crabtown Atlanta, GA The Athens of the South Atlanta, GA The City Too Busy to Hate Atlanta, GA Dogwood City Atlanta, GA Gate City of the South Auckland, NZ City of Sails Baltimore, Maryland Charm City Baltimore, Maryland Monument City Banaras, India Luminous City Bandon, OR Storm Capital of the World Bangkok, Thailand Venice of the East Beaver, OKCow Chip Throwing Capital of the World Bemidji, MNHome of Paul Bunyan & Babe, the Blue Ox (see Brainerd and Westwood) Beograd The White City Bickleton, WA Bluebird Capital of the World Birmingham, AL Pittsburgh of the South Boston, MA The Athens of America Boston, MA Beantown Boston, MA The City of Kind Hearts Boston, MA The Cradle of Liberty Boston, MA The Hub of the Universe Boston, MA Puritan City Brainerd, MNHome of Paul Bunyan & Babe, the Blue Ox —

 The legend on the Brainerd city limits sign shows up in the film "Fargo".

(See Bemidji and Westwood) Bristol, TNFood City Brandon, Manitoba The Wheat City Bucharest, Romania The Little Paris Budapest, Hungary The Pearl of the Danube Buffalo, New York Bison City Buffalo, New York Flour City Buffalo, NY The City of Good Neighbors Buffalo, NY The Nickel City Buffalo, NY The Queen City (of the Great Lakes) Burlington, IowaLoader/Backhoe Capital of the World Butte, Montana Copper City Byran, Ohio The Fountain City Calgary, Alberta, Canada The Stampede City Calgary, Alberta, Canada The Heart of The New West (that's the New Convention and Visitors Bureau slogan) Calgary, Alberta, Canada Canada's oil capital (Because of high concentration of oil company head offices, as in Houston) Cape Girardeau, Missouri Rose City Cape Hatteras, North Carolina The Graveyard of the Atlantic Castroville, CA Artichoke Center of the World Champaign-Urbana, IL Chambana Champaign-Urbana, IL Shampoo-Bananna Champaign-Urbana, IL Urpaign Charleston, South Carolina America's Most Historic City Charleston, South CarolinaPalmetto City Charlotte, North Carolina Hornets Nest Charlotte, North Carolina Queen City Chicago, Illinois Big Town Chicago City of

 Big Shoulders Chicago, Illinois Hog Butcher for the World Chicago Slaughterhouse to the World Chicago, Illinois Phoenix City Chicago, Illinois Second City Chicago The Windy City Christchurch, NZ The Garden City Cincinnati, Ohio Queen City Cleveland, Ohio Mistake on the Lake Cleveland, OH America's North Coast Cody, WYRodeo Capital of the World Columbus, OH The Crossroads of Ohio Cooperstown, New York Birthplace of Baseball Council Bluffs, Iowa Iowa's Leading Edge Crestwood (Louisville), KYWhiskers Cuernavaca, Morelos, MexicoThe City of Eternal Spring Dallas, Texas Big D Dayton, Ohio Birthplace of Aviation Denver, Colorado City of the Plains Denver, Colorado Convention City Denver, CO Mile High City Denver, Colorado Queen City Detroit, MI Motown Detroit, MI Motor City Dipolog City, Philippines Orchid City Douglas, WYJackalope Capitol [sic] of the World — I vaguely recall that one of the main promoters and/or inventor of the Jackelope died within the last few months.

Durham, NC City of Medicine Durham, NC Bull City Edinburgh, Scotland Athens of the North Erie, Pennsylvania The Gem Eskilstuna, Sweden Smedstan (The smith City) Fallbrook, CA Avocado Capital of the World Florence, Italy The City of Lillies Fort Myers, Florida The City of Palms Frannie, WYBiggest Little Town in Wyoming Gainesville, Florida Hogtown Gallup, NMDrunk-Driving Capital of America Gilroy, CA Garlic Capital of the World Gotland, Sweden Pearl of the Baltic Göteborg, Sweden Götet Granby, COSnowmobile Capital of Colorado Grants Pass, Oregon"It's the Climate" ...

see Grants Pass, OregonWhere the Rogue River Runs Greenfield, CA Broccoli Capital of the World Hammondsport, New York Cradle of Aviation Hawthorne, CA The City of Good Neighbors (2) Hershey, PAChocolate Town, USA Hollywood Hollyweird Hollywood Tinseltown Holtville, CA Carrot Capital of the World Hong Kong Pearl of the Orient Hood River, Oregon (Columbia Gorge) Windsurfing Capital of the World Hoople, North DakotaTater Town Houston, Texas Magnolia City Indianapolis, Indiana Naptown Indianapolis, Indiana Circle City Indianapolis, Indiana Railroad City Indio, CA Date Capital of the World International Falls, Minnesota The Icebox of the United States Isleton, CACrawdad Town, USA Jackson, Mississippi Chimneyville Jaipur The Pink City Jerusalem City of David Jerusalem City of Peace Jönköping, SwedenSmålands Jerusalem Kalamazoo, Michigan Celery City Kansas City, Kansas Heart of America Kokomo, Indiana City of Firsts Kristianstad, Sweden Lilla Paris (rare these days) Keizer, OR Iris Capital of the World Kelseyville, CA Pear Capital of the World (but see here ).

Laramie, WYGem City of the Plains Las VegasSin City Las VegasEntertainment Capital of the World Las VegasCity of Lights Las Vegas, Nevada (downtown)Glitter Gulch Las Vegas, Nevada (downtown)The Strip Letchworth (UK, near Cambridge) The first Garden City in the World Lodi, CAThe [Tokay] Grape Capital of the World (probably more popularly known as the place where Creedence Clearwater Revival got stuck in once, in the 1960's.) London, England The Square Mile London's financial district The City of London London, Ontario The Forest City Los Angeles The Big Orange Los Angeles City of Angels Los Angeles, California City of Flowers and Sunshine Los Angeles La La Land Los Banos City of the Spring Baths Louisville, Kentucky City of Beautiful Churches Louisville, Kentucky Falls City Lowell, WYThe Rose City of Wyoming Madison, Wisconsin Four Lake City Manila, Philippines Pearl of the Orient Mar del Plata, Argentina Queen of the Coast Marysville, California Gateway to the Gold Fields Medellin, Columbia Orchid City Meeteetse, WYWhere Chiefs Meet Melbourne, AustraliaCity of Chromatic Dissolution (not a real nickname, but I really liked the phrase.

I'll have to dig up the film , someday.) Memphis, TN Bluff City Memphis, TN The City that Elvis Ruined (I get a Googlewhack for that one! Today, anyway.) Miami, Florida Little Cuba Miami, Florida Magic City Milwaukee, Wisconsin Cream City Minneapolis, Minnesota Flour City Minneapolis The Mini Apple Minneapolis/St.

Paul, MN The Twin Cities Mobile, Alabama City of Five Flags Montreal, Canada The City of Saints Mountain Iron, Minnesota Taconite Capital of the World Moyobamba, Peru Orchid City Nashville, TN Music City, USA New Haven, Connecticut Elm City New Orleans The Big Easy New Orleans The Crescent City New York The Big Apple New York The Capital of the World New YorkThe City that Never Sleeps New York Gotham New York Empire City New York The Melting Pot New York/Manhattan The City Norrköping, Sweden Peking Noxubee County, Alabama Home of the Dancing Rabbit Festival and Magnolia Pilgrimage (I know, it's not really a city, but how could I pass up a phrase like that?) Oakdale, CA Cowboy Capital of the World Oakland, CA Oaktown Oroville, CA City of Gold Oxford City of Dreaming Spires Oxnard, CA Strawberry Capital of the World (but see here ).

Paris City of Light Pasadena, CA City of Roses Patterson, CA Apricot Capital of the World Pearsonville, CA Hubcap Capital of the World Petaluma, CA Egg Basket of the World Petra The Rose Red City Philadelphia City of Brotherly Love Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Rebel Capital Philadelphia, PAMortal City (per Dar Williams) Pittsburgh, PA Steel City Pittsburgh, PA The 'Burgh Pittsburgh, PA Iron City Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania The Birmingham of America Pittsburgh, PA (downtown) Golden Triangle Pittsburgh, PA (downtown) Three Rivers Pittsburgh, PA (region) City of Bridges Placerville, CA Hangtown Portland, Maine Forest City Portland, Maine Hill City Portland, Oregon City of Roses Prague, Czech Republic The Golden City Providence, Rhode Island Beehive of Industry Quebec The Gibraltar of North America Queenstown, NZ Extreme Sports Capital of the World Redmond, WA Mordor Redmond, WA Nerdburg Reno, NV The Biggest Little City in the World Reseda, CA The Hub of the West Valley (That's the San Fernando Valley) Rigby, IdahoBirthplace of TV There's a museum here, the "TV and Pioneer Museum" .

When I drove through, it made me wonder jest which of those Conestoga wagons had TVs, and how good the reception was. Rincon (Santa Barbara County), California Queen of the Coast Surfers' term. Not really a city. Rochester, New York Kodak City Rochester, New York Snapshot City Rockport, MAThe Mendocino of the East Rogue River Valley, OR Pear Capital of the World (but see here ).

Rome The City of the Seven Hills Rome, Italy The Eternal City Rome, Italy City of Love Rye, New York Border Town Sacramento, California River City Saint Louis, MOGateway to the West (or "The Gateway City") Saint Paul, MinnesotaMoscow on the Mississippi Saint Petersburg, Russia Venice of the North Salem, Massachusetts City of Witches Samal, Philipines Island Garden City of Samal (IGaCoS) San Antonio, Texas Alamo City San Antonio, Texas Mission City San Diego, California The Plymouth of the West San Diego, CA America's Finest City San Francisco, California The Golden Gate City San Francisco, California Shaky Town San Francisco, CA Baghdad by the Bay San Francisco, CA The City North San Jose, CA The Golden Triangle Santa Fe, New Mexico The City Different Santa Rosa, NMThe SCUBA-diving capital of New Mexico Saratoga Springs, New York Spa City Savannah, Georgia Garden City Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario The SOO Sault Ste.

Marie, MI (I think) The SOO Seattle, WA The Emerald City Selma, CA Raisin Capital of the World Shah Alam, Malaysia Orchid City Sonora, CAThe Queen of the Southern Mines Sri Lanka Pearl of the Indian Ocean (I know, not really a city.) Stockholm Eken (The Oak) Stockholm Venice of the North Stockton, CA California's Sunrise Seaport Sturgis, MichiganCurtain Rod Capital of the World Sundbyberg, Sweden Sumpan Syracuse, New York Salt City Taxco, MexicoSilver Capital of the World Thousand Oaks, CA T.O. Tijuana, MexicoTelevision Capital of the World Toledo, Ohio Corn City Toronto, Ontario Hogtown Toronto, Ontario Muddy York (archaic, I think) Toronto, Ontario T.O.

Toronto, Ontario Toronto the Good (sometimes pejorative) Toronto, Ontario Trawna or Trahna Toronto, Ontario, Canada Queen City Tulelake, CA Horseradish Capital of the World Umeå, SwedenBjörkarnas stad (The city of the birches) (Historic) Vancouver, B.C., CanadaGastown Venice, Italy Bride of the Sea Venice, Italy Queen of the Adriatic Värnersborg, SwedenLilla Paris (Little Paris) Västerås Gurkstan (The Cucumber City) Vicksburg, Mississippi The Gibraltar of America Victoria, Australia The Cabbage Patch Victoria, B.C., Canada Little England Walla Walla, WA The Town So Nice They Named It Twice Walla Walla, WA Walla2 Walla Walla, WA Wallyworld Washington D.C. Capital City Washington D.C. News Capital of the World Waterbury, Connecticut Brass City Wenatchee, WA Apple Capital of the World West Hollywood, CA Boystown West Hollywood, CA The Creative City West Palm Beach, Florida Orchid City Westwood, CAHome of Paul Bunyan & Babe, the Blue Ox It seems that a celebrity like Paul Bunyan has several homes.

I've actually seen him here in Westwood — and note that this is the Lassen County Westwood. (See and also see Brainerd and Bemidji.) Wheeling, West Virginia Nail City Wichita, Kansas Emerald City Windsor, Ontario Tijuana North NOTES: I used to have some of the following ones in the main list. I have moved these here mostly for not being unique enough (i.e., Google found too many candidates for the given honor). I should probably move all of the "Queen City"s down here, too. A recent contributor mentioned Coos Bay, Oregon as having (had) the official motto "City With a Future".

Alas, Google says that this is one of the too-common ones: Lansing, KS; Mankato, MN (had this motto in 1912); Yokosuka, Japan; Ruda [approx equal]öl[florin]Öska, Poland; Massillon, Ohio; Fulton, NY?; Monett, MO; ¬¶widnica, Poland; Lisbon, Portugal; Sumner, Iowa; St Louis, MO; Tremonton, Utah And it has a few variations: Altus, Oklahoma: "City with a Future to Share" Kenai, Alaska: "THE VILLAGE WITH A PAST - THE CITY WITH A FUTURE" Lowell, Arkansas: "Town with a Past, City with a Future" Beersheba: "A place with a past, a city with a future" "City of Champions" (Joliet, Illinois; Brockton, Massachusetts; Duncanville, Texas; Lilburn, Georgia; Edmonton, Alberta; Detroit, Michigan; Los Angeles, California; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania). (Pittsburgh has really really bad Google-juice.

I have a vague recollection that it (and Edmonton) were the two "City of Champions"s on my original list. But Pittsburgh is way down low on the Google-meter search for "City of Champions".) "City of Gold" (Gold Beach, OR; Oroville, California; Cite de l'or, Quebec; Gold Coast City in Australia; Victor, Colorado; etc) "City of Love" (Glasgow, San Francisco, Calcutta, Paris) "City of Roses" — Pasadena, California (my first home town) has held the Rose Parade for more than a century now; this gives it first dibs on this monicker. I had also seen Portland, Oregon referred to this way. But Google gives the nod to ?Cape Girardeau, Missouri??? Weird.

The "City That Time Forgot" (Baldwin Park, CA; Galena, IL; New Orleans; Tikal, Guatemala; Bruges/Brugge, Belgium; and a host of others) Cowtown (Both Edmonton and Calgary, Alberta; Chicago; Columbus, OH; Dallas; Kansas City; Wichita, KS; et al) "The All-American City" (I gather there's an award by this name, whose value is enormously diluted by the fact that it is bestowed annually on 10 cities. It is the National Civic League that does this.) Here are a few of the winners, plus other places that claim this title either on the web, or in email I've seen lately: Tri-Cities of TN/VA; Ocean City, MD; Tuscaloosa-Northport Tupelo MI; Roswell, NM; Santa Clara, CA; Delray Beach, FL; South Miami, FL; Fort Dodge, IA; Howard County, MD; Ocean City, MD; Independence, MO; Bozeman, MT; Fayetteville, NC; Brownsville, TX; Allentown, PA The End of the World.

(Not to be confused with The End of the Internet , of which there are also a whole bunch). Trosa, Sweden; Ushuaia, Argentina; Anchorage, AK; Gibraltar Gateway to the Rockies (Denver and Aurora Colorado; and Calgary, Hinton, and Banff, Alberta. Probably dozens of others.) Devin T McLaughlin suggested a bunch of nicknames for Calgary; some ("Entrepreneurial City" and "Volunteer City") failed the google test (didn't really show up at all), and Cowtown fails in the other direction (see above). Cotton Capital of { World, USA, Western Australia, etc... } "The Garden City" is an unusual one: there appear to be a number of cities with "Garden" as a part of their real names, which makes it a bit hard to sift out and locate the one(s) where it's just a nickname. I left three of these in the main list; Christchurch is Phil Pearson's fault, and the others came from a Google search to see if the nickname was too common for my tastes. pre-Thanksgiving update: Hogtown goes to Toronto mainly, though Gainesville put in a strong enough #2 showing.

So at this point, only one of the nicknames from my original list remains unidentified -- i.e., I haven't quite figured out with enough certainty to put it back in place yet: "The Paris of the 1980's". Maybe Seattle. Gaining no confidence from Google, I'll probably just drop that one. And the other two cities that I didn't find matches for are in Ontario, Canada — Copetown and Welland. My google efforts did not come up with any nickname for either. These will have to wait until I re-locate my original list or check some of the other sites I've listed above. Thanks to Erland, Margaret, Phil, Devin, Drew, Isaac, Kunaal, Dave Letterman, the film "Fargo", and anyone else who contributed suggestions! © Copyright 2006 Doug Landauer . Athens | national capital, Greece | Britannica.com national capital, Greece Athens, Modern Greek Athínai, Ancient Greek Athēnai, historic city and capital of Greece. Many of Classical civilization’s intellectual and artistic ideas originated there, and the city is generally considered to be the birthplace of Western civilization. The Acropolis and surrounding area, Athens.

Neil Beer/Getty Images Athens and the Acropolis, including the Parthenon and the Erechtheum. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Overview of Athens. Contunico © ZDF Enterprises GmbH, Mainz Athens lies 5 miles (8 km) from the Bay of Phaleron, an inlet of the Aegean (Aigaíon) Sea where Piraeus (Piraiévs), the port of Athens, is situated, in a mountain-girt arid basin divided north-south by a line of hills. Greater Athens has an area of 165 square miles (427 square km). The Kifisós River, only a trickle in summer, flows through the western half; the Ilisós River, often dry, traverses the eastern half. The surrounding mountains—Párnis, 4,636 feet (1,413 metres); Pentelicus (Pendéli), 3,631 feet; Hymettos (Imittós), 3,365 feet; and Aigáleon, 1,535 feet—add to the impression of barrenness.

Yet such considerations are superficial when compared with the fecundity of Athens’s bequests to the world, such as its philosophy, its architecture, its literature, and its political ideals. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. For treatment of the city in its regional setting, see Greece ; historical and cultural aspects are treated further in the article ancient Greek civilization . Physical and human geography Character of the city Athens, with its tall buildings and contemporary shops, is the first European city when approached from the Middle East . When approached from the west, from elsewhere in Europe , what strikes the visitor is the influence of the East—in the food, music, and clamorous street life—perhaps vestiges of a time when Athens was divorced from European society under the yoke of Ottoman rule. Nevertheless, it is wrong to say that Athens is a mixture of East and West: it is Greek and, more particularly, Athenian. The city, after all, nurtured Western civilization thousands of years ago. Athens remains on the world stage to this day, most recently as the designated host of the 2004 Olympic Games . Athens as viewed from the Acropolis. S.

Vannini/DeA Picture Library Pátrai Some three centuries after the death of Pericles (429 bce), Athenians entered upon a period of bondage that lasted almost 2,000 years. The city was freed in 1833, and in the following 170 years it was the scene of more than a dozen revolutions, another brutal foreign occupation, and a civil war of especial savagery. This long history of passion and suffering has had considerable effect on the Athenian character. The core of that character is an implacable will to survive, buttressed by a profound sense of loyalty (especially to the family) and patriotism. The Greek Orthodox Church , which is directed by a synod sitting in Athens, was a main force in keeping alive the Greek language , tradition, and literature when such things were forbidden, and most people still support it. The millennia of oppression, instead of driving the Athenians into obtuse moroseness, have honed their wit and rendered them tough but supple, while centuries of privation have only preserved their warmth and generosity. The long oral tradition, alive even under the invader, has reflected and stimulated a taste for rich talk.

Of course, the poetic impulse to make a good story better leads to considerable exaggeration in daily conversation, suiting a vanity that goes with a sharp-edged sense of personal and family honour and the spoiling of children. The ancient heroes, too, were vain about both themselves and honour, boasting as much about outwitting the enemy as about outfighting him. The landscape Erechtheum, on the Acropolis in Athens. © Ron Gatepain (A Britannica Publishing Partner) The Propylaea , the matchless entryway into the Acropolis, was the only opening in the surrounding wall. Just in front of it and to the left is the 27-foot-high pedestal for the thank offering to Agrippa , the victor of the Battle of Actium , who interceded for Athens, which had supported the loser, Mark Antony . To the right was the temple of Athena Nike (Giver of Victory), 27 feet long and 18 1/2 feet wide, which stood untouched until the Turks demolished it in 1686 to use the stones as defenses against the Venetians.

In 1836 it was badly restored, and 100 years later its foundations began to slip into previously undiscovered Turkish cisterns, revealing the 6th-century foundations of Peisistratus’s earlier shrine to Artemis Epipyrgidea (Artemis on the Tower). The temple was then more accurately reconstructed. The northern wing of the Propylaea, the Pinakotheke , was used by the Frankish dukes, who reconstructed the interior to make a two-story building. In the 12th century Greek Orthodox bishops lived in the Pinakotheke, and in the 14th century the dynasty of Athenian dukes from Florence turned the Propylaea into a fortified castle with a Tuscan tower, which Heinrich Schliemann , the German excavator who discovered Troy, paid to have dismantled in 1875. Learn about the buildings of the Acropolis of Athens, Greece, particularly the Propylaeum, the … © Open University (A Britannica Publishing Partner) When the Turks, who had occupied Athens since 1456, departed, they left the monuments in a state of ruin, the ground covered with garden plots, and several hundred small huts.

After Greece won its independence, Otto, the first king of the Hellenes, had everything that postdated the Classical period swept away, set scholars to work identifying the remains, and encouraged some reconstruction. According to Pausanias , the Greek traveller and geographer of the 2nd century ce, the colossal 30-foot-high bronze seated statue of Athena Promachos (Athena Who Fights in the Foremost Ranks), by the 5th-century-bce Athenian sculptor Phidias , was set up in the open behind the Propylaea, her gleaming helmet and spear visible to mariners off Cape Sunium (Soúnion) 30 miles away. The 6th-century Byzantine emperor Justinian carried the statue off to Constantinople (now Istanbul), just as Phidias’s ivory and gold statue of Athena had been taken from the Parthenon. Both of these masterpieces were lost to other looters in the Crusaders ’ sack of Constantinople in 1204.

Other statues stood in profusion amid small temples, such as the sculptor Myron ’s group of Marsyas and Athena, his Perseus, and his heifer; Phidias’s Lemnian Athena and his Pericles; and a gigantic bronze effigy of the Trojan horse . There was an altar to Athena Hygeia (the Health Giver), a precinct sacred to the goddess Artemis Brauronia (named after a statue of her, brought from the town of Brauron), the Pandroseum (a building named after Pandrosos, a girl associated with Athena in legend), where the sacred olive tree of Athena grew, and beyond the Parthenon the great altar of Athena. Other notable buildings Below the Acropolis sanctuary, on the southwest slope of the hill, Herodes Atticus , a rich Roman, built a 5,000-seat odeum as a memorial to his wife in 161 ce. A conventional Roman theatre except that the semicircular auditorium was hollowed out of the rock, it was roofed in cedar and had a three-story facade of arches. Repaired but roofless, it is now used for the Athens summer festival of music and drama .

A 300-yard-long portico stretching toward the Theatre of Dionysus had been built some 300 years earlier. The Dionysiac theatre itself, scooped out of the south slope early in the 5th century, replaced the Agora stage as the drama centre. It also replaced the Pnyx as the meeting place for the popular assembly. Rebuilt many times, the ruined theatre now visible is largely Roman, the last construction work on the stage probably dating from the early 3rd century ce. The Dionysia , the spring festival, which drew crowds from many parts of Greece and colonies in Asia Minor and Italy , was held in this theatre, which had 13,000 seats in 67 rows. The jury had larger front seats and the ecclesiastical dignitaries small stone thrones, on which their titles can still be read. Three tragic and four comic plays were presented in competition for the prize. Production costs were met by private sponsors who, when their choruses won the prize tripod, displayed it in an elaborate memorial in the Street of Tripods to the east of the theatre.

The only one of these monuments still standing is that of Lysicrates , erected 334 bce, a small circular temple 21 1/2 feet high, its six columns an early example of the Corinthian order. The monument was preserved through incorporation into a convent (in which the English poet Lord Byron had a study) and influenced British Georgian and Regency architecture through the engravings of the Edinburgh artist “Athenian” Stuart. Farther east lay the Odeum of Pericles, and to the west are traces (420 bce) of the precinct of Asclepius , the god of healing, which took the form of a hospital portico for patients and temples decorated with votive reliefs. Odeum, Athens, built by Herodes Atticus in 161 ce as a memorial to his wife. A. Vergani/DeA Picture Library On the Hill of Ares , the god of war, to the right of the descent from the Propylaea, a legendary jury of gods spared Ares from execution for the murder of the sea god Poseidon’s son.

Trials for homicide continued to be heard on this hill through the ages, and the Supreme Court of Greece still bears the name. Across Apostólou Pávlou (Apostle Paul Avenue) are the Hill of the Nymphs, where an Austro-Greek, Baron Sina, built an observatory in 1842; the Hill of the Muses, crowned with the remains of the marble monument to Philopappus, a Syrian who was Roman consul in the 2nd century ce; and the middle hill, the Pnyx (Tightly Crowded Together), the meeting place of the Ecclesia , the assembly of 18,000 citizens who heard the great Athenian orators. (In fact, attendance of more than 5,000 persons was rare at any gathering, but the Pnyx would still have been crowded.) The Agora The avenue leads down to the Agora , which the American School of Classical Studies started restoring in 1931, paying $2.5 million compensation to the several hundred families living there. Financed by, among others, the Rockefeller Foundation , the Marshall Plan , and the Greek government, the work went on until 1960.

It includes what has been called “the pitiless replica of a 180-columned portico of the 2nd century bc,” which serves as a museum. At the approaches to the Agora is the best-preserved of all Greek temples, the Theseum (5th century bce). Although virtually intact and absolutely genuine, it has all the deadness of a latter-day reproduction. The beauty, the mystery, and the genius that render the Parthenon incandescent eluded the architects and builders of the Theseum. The Horologium and the Orthodox cathedrals Another monument is the octagonal, 42-foot-high marble Horologium of Andronicus of Cyrrhus , usually called the Tower of the Winds because each side bears a weather-beaten figure of the wind from that particular compass point. It used to have a sundial, a water clock for telling the hour on cloudy days, and a weather vane. The Turks left it unchanged, believing it to be the tomb of two local prophets, Sakhratis and Aflatun (Socrates and Plato).

In the shadow of the 19th-century, neo-Byzantine Greek Orthodox Cathedral (Mitrópolis) nestles the 12th-century Mitrópolis, Áyios Elefthérios, one of three genuine Byzantine churches still surviving. It is red brick, like the others, and tiny. Its Pentelic marble is ruddied with age, and its outer walls are artfully, if promiscuously, decorated with Classical Greek tidbits: panels, votive tablets, and morsels of frieze. Like its sisters, this retired cathedral is charming, unassuming, and comforting. The people The population of Greater Athens increased considerably after the war of independence in the early 1830s. The rapid growth was largely attributable to the great influx of refugees from Asia Minor in the early 1920s and the migration of rural inhabitants from the provinces during World War II and the communist rebellion (1946–49). By the 1960s Athens had become a bustling cosmopolitan city. Almost all Greeks adhere to the Eastern (Greek) Orthodox faith.

The economy Industry and trade Since World War I Athens has become the hub of all mercantile business, export and import. With Piraeus it is the most important manufacturing city in Greece. Athens accounts for half of the jobs in industry and handicrafts, and earnings are much higher than the national average. There are cloth and cotton mills, distilleries, breweries, potteries, flour mills, soap factories, tanneries, chemical works, and carpet factories. Exports include olive oil, tomato products, wine, cement, bauxite, and textile manufactures. Publishing enterprises are important. The brilliant Attic light, however, is now dimmed by the pall of air pollution hovering over the city. To discourage new factories from further adding to the problem and to stimulate the economic growth of other regions, an industrial wage tax has been imposed in the Athens area, and tax incentives have been offered to new factories set up in other areas. Transportation and shipping Athens accounts for more than half of the cars, trucks, and buses in use in the nation.

Furthermore, the number of merchant ships registered in Greece (mostly at Piraeus, the country’s largest port) has increased as Greek shipowners, since the late 1960s, have answered the government’s call to bring their foreign-registered ships home (though many Greek ships remain under other flags). Scores of shipping offices have opened in refurbished Piraeus, while on weekends shipping magnates sail to the nearby islands of Hydra and Spetse in chrome-fitted luxury yachts, flying Panamanian and Liberian flags. The metropolitan transit system includes an electrified rail line, buses, and trolleys. The electric railway, which connects Piraeus in the south with the suburb of Kifisiá in the north, runs underground within Athens proper. Larissa , the main railway station, links the city with the rest of the country and the continent. Edinburgh World Heritage - Why Athens of the North? Edinburgh World Heritage - Why Athens of the North? Home › Learning › Learning › Athens of the North › Why Athens of the North? Why Athens of the North? Edinburgh gave itself the title ‘Athens of the North’ to express its growing importance and sense of achievement.

Throughout the 1700s the architecture of ancient Rome had been the inspiration for designing buildings. British architects such as Robert Adam would go on a grand tour of Italy as a part of their education, drawing inspiration from the ancient ruins they visited. In 1755 British travellers brought back with them sketches of ancient ruins in Athens, such as the Parthenon and the Acropolis. The fashion for this style of classical architecture grew, and ancient Greek styles came to influence everything from hair-dressing to tea sets. Edinburgh had started to built its New Town in the 1770s, but there were few grand public buildings, and as the confidence of the city grew so did calls for suitable monuments to show its achievements. In 1822 the Edinburgh artist Hugh William Williams held an exhibition of his watercolours of Athens displayed alongside views of Edinburgh, inviting visitors to see the likeness in the setting of the two cities. The idea caught the popular imagination and soon everyone was using the phrase ‘Modern Athens’ to describe the city.

Question: Which European city is nicknamed the Athens of the North?
Answer: Edinburgh