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The Development of Cities in Italy 1300 – 1861

Author

Listed:
  • Maarten Bosker
  • Steven Brakman
  • Harry Garretsen
  • Herman de Jong
  • Marc Schramm

Abstract

The evolution of city growth is usually studied for relatively short time periods. The rise and decline of cities is, however, typically a process that takes many decades or even centuries. In this paper we study the evolution of Italian cities over the period 1300-1861. The first contribution of our paper is that we use various descriptive statistics on individual city sizes and the city-size distribution as a whole to highlight the main characteristics of Italy’s urban system such as the differences between northern and southern Italy. Our second, and main, contribution is that our data allow for panel estimation where city-size is regressed on various geographical, political and other determinants of city size for the period 1300-1861. We show that, although large shocks such as the plague epidemics are clearly visible in the data, the main determinants of Italy’s city growth invariably are physical geography and political predominance. Also the North-South difference turns out to be important.

Suggested Citation

  • Maarten Bosker & Steven Brakman & Harry Garretsen & Herman de Jong & Marc Schramm, 2007. "The Development of Cities in Italy 1300 – 1861," CESifo Working Paper Series 1893, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_1893
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Ibragimov Marat & Khamidov Rufat, 2010. "Heavy-Tailedness and Volatility in Emerging Foreign Exchange Markets: Theory and Empirics," EERC Working Paper Series 10/06e, EERC Research Network, Russia and CIS.
    2. Ankudinov, Andrei & Ibragimov, Rustam & Lebedev, Oleg, 2017. "Heavy tails and asymmetry of returns in the Russian stock market," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 200-219.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
    • R12 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity; Interregional Trade (economic geography)

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    1. Historical Economic Geography

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