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I always struggle with the difference between a town and a city, because Dutch has only one word for them: stad. A stad (plural "steden" is something that in th

by mcv 4y ago

I always struggle with the difference between a town and a city, because Dutch has only one word for them: stad. A stad (plural "steden" is something that in the middle ages had city rights (or is it town rights?), a dorp (village) does not. And this has lead Netherland to have some steden of only a few hundred inhabitants, while some villages have more than 100,000, which of course makes no sense. The place I grew up in even has "dorp" in its name, so I will always consider it a village (besides, there's nothing to do there, but I guess that goes with suburbs), but it has about 100k inhabitants by now. I guess to me, the real difference is density and how much there is to do. A city has a bar on almost every street corner, a village, no matter how big, does not.

GoldenRacer 4y ago
Cities and towns sound pretty similar to your steden and dorp. The US can get complicated because every state defines things their own way but generally there are different legal requirements and rights for cities vs towns. In North Carolina there is a "city" called Brevard with a population of just under 8,000 but you also have the "town" of Cary with population 170,000. Of course there is still the issue of how the words are commonly used vs their actual legal definition but if you ask 100 different people the difference between a city and town, you'll get 100 slightly different definitions. Someone that grew up in New York City will have a very different definition than someone that grew up in Wyoming 50 miles from the nearest gas station. At the end of the day, there's just some vague notion that cities are bigger than towns.
- Symbiote 4y ago
  A dorp is a village, note all the English village names ending in -thorp or -thorpe. Although we can't trust the cognates, as 'stad' is related to English 'stead', which meant a settlement of any size.
pg_1234 4y ago
Traditionally the distinction was you had to have a cathedral to be a city. ... I suppose the modern equivalent is a CBD.

by mcv 4y ago

GoldenRacer 4y ago

Cities and towns sound pretty similar to your steden and dorp. The US can get complicated because every state defines things their own way but generally there are different legal requirements and rights for cities vs towns. In North Carolina there is a "city" called Brevard with a population of just under 8,000 but you also have the "town" of Cary with population 170,000. Of course there is still the issue of how the words are commonly used vs their actual legal definition but if you ask 100 different people the difference between a city and town, you'll get 100 slightly different definitions. Someone that grew up in New York City will have a very different definition than someone that grew up in Wyoming 50 miles from the nearest gas station. At the end of the day, there's just some vague notion that cities are bigger than towns.

Symbiote 4y ago
A dorp is a village, note all the English village names ending in -thorp or -thorpe. Although we can't trust the cognates, as 'stad' is related to English 'stead', which meant a settlement of any size.

pg_1234 4y ago

Traditionally the distinction was you had to have a cathedral to be a city. ... I suppose the modern equivalent is a CBD.