Amazing quiz! But I only got 11..... I think my biggest achievement on this quiz was Tønsberg in Norway, but that is probably because I'm norwegian and I've heard about it my entire life and even been there, so... Funny anyway. I will come back and do it again in a couple of days, and hopefully I'll get over more than the average ;)
Glad you liked it! :) I think for most of these they are famous or at least well-known within their own country but little known to the outside world. For example a lot of Americans know about St Augustine, Jamestown, Roanoke and Williamsburg but few non-Americans would know what those were. The Acoma and Taos Pueblos are even more obscure.
Today, for the first time ever, I finally scored 100% on this quiz. Very happy with myself. :D I'm planning to visit several of these places in the coming years after I leave Saudi Arabia behind. Planning the trips probably helped some.
Searching "Oldest cities in Sweden", in both English and Swedish, gives either Lund or Sigtuna, both founded in the late 900s, with Skara after the year 1000 C.E. Lund is sometimes not counted, as that part of modern Sweden was Danish when the city was founded.
More research gives Sigtuna as 980, Lund as 990, and Skara as sometime after 1000. The 988 date for Skara is considered to be local legend. Even if true, Sigtuna beats it by 8 years. Part of the issue is when a "town" turned into a "city"...but most Swedes today would say Sigtuna is oldest.
I may also need to update Ukraine and Russia... as neither Kerch nor Feodosiya are still in the Ukraine if Russian annexation of Crimea is allowed to stand, and they are both much older than Staraya Ladoga. This would be unfortunate as the latter actually has some connection to Russian history while the former have simply been occupied.
Was feeling really bad that I only scored 23, then saw it was 90%. Never heard of some of these but kicking myself for missing Zurich, Krakow, Osaka, Santo Domingo, and Jericho. Time for coffee.
I didn't realize I'd taken this one before. I took it again and just scored 34. I think I'm retaining more from these quizzes than I realize. Great quiz, btw.
I'll need to update this at some point and when I do I may add a few. For now I'm waiting to see how the Russian annexation of Crimea ultimately plays out as it has implications for this quiz.
You should accept Aarhus for Århus as it's a legitimate alternative spelling in Danish. If I remember right it's even the official spelling these days as they wanted to get rid of the Å that causes problems in international contexts. In general in Danish "aa" is pronounced the same as "å" and an acceptable substitute most of the time. Just like ae = æ and oe = ø.
Dublin isn't the oldest city in Ireland. That honour goes to Waterford City, which was settled (roughly) in 914 CE by the Vikings. The city actually had it's 1100th anniversary earlier this year. Dublin's founding is a little more hazy for some reason. Though there was a settlement in the modern day county of Dublin in 841 it wasn't where the city is currently located which was indeed founded in the 10th century but is universally accepted to have been after the settling of Waterford.
Thanks for the info. If I ever get around to updating this I'll look into it, though there seems to be an inconsistent definition of what exactly constitutes a city on the Wikipedia page that this was originally sourced from.
I agree. If I ever get around to updating/expanding/correcting this quiz, and I intend to, some day... then I'll add that to the list of things to fix. Thanks.
Amman is one of the oldest cities in the world (which can be seen when you visit it), infact, it was called Rabbath Ammon already in the 13th century, so I think you should correct this...
I've been there. Before the 13th century it was called Philadelphia and was a Roman city. I think the problem is that it has been periodically abandoned and then repopulated, and thus, hasn't been "continually inhabited"
Stoked to be part of the 0% that got Kerikeri. I am from New Zealand so I suppose it's unfair, but it did take me a few goes. Awesome quiz - really difficult - but still very interesting.
Excellent quiz kalbahamut! Maybe you should consider also accepting Maastricht for the Netherlands, as it is matter of some debate which city exactly deserves the title.
You live next to a site that 7,000 years ago was one of the largest and most sophisticated human settlements in the world and has been continually inhabited ever since? Cool.
Byzantium is an old city, no doubt, but... not by the standards of Turkey. There are *many* cities *way* older than Istanbul located in Turkey, what with it being near the birthplace of civilization and all. In fact many of the oldest human settlements and cave dwellings in the world are in Turkey. Byzantium was colonized by Greeks in 657 BC. Gaziantep, or Antep, was first settled sometime roughly 6,000 years ago. Big difference.
Erbil and Irbil both really need to be allowed for Arbil, which I believe is the Arabic name, but not the most commonly used in English. Erbil is the spelling used by Wikipedia and Google Maps, though the former also lists Irbil (which I've encountered in some press reports) and Arbil. Wikipedia also gives Hewler as the actual Kurdish name, so maybe include that too (though I was personally unaware of it).
The Arabic name is أربيل, and not written in Roman letters, which is why there are so many variants when transliterated. It's the same story with a lot of different words. Vowels are not so important in Arabic.
Mostly Wikipedia's article on the subject. I've come across several errors. Russia has no annexed the oldest cities in Ukraine. There are more countries I would like to add that don't appear on the Wikipedia list. I've been meaning to update this for years and just never got around to it.
I like how the "interesting fact" that I got after taking this quiz was so applicable to the quiz itself: "New Zealand was completely uninhabited by people until around 1250 AD."
London, Bath, and Colchester were all founded as Roman cities soon after the Roman conquest around 43 AD. But you have a point maybe I ought to make it a 3-way tie. And some sources call Colchester the oldest town in England, though when exactly a town, village, or settlement becomes a "city" is a source of a lot of confusion on this quiz and might be part of the issue here, as well.
Colchester is definitely older than London or Bath, but it is technically a town rather than a city. Having said that, the definition of a city in the UK is rather tighter than in many other countries, requiring either a cathedral or a royal charter. The population of Colchester is around 200,000, which would make it a city by most standards.
I've read about it. Some claim that the city was referenced by Ptolemy but other historians doubt this. There used to be a discussion here about it but it seems those comments are gone, now. Anyway, from the reading I did it seemed like Krakow had a stronger claim.
Ukraine is already on the quiz with 2 cities that are both far older than Kiev. However, if I ever update this again, I'm going to have to look in to that because both of the Ukrainian cities listed are in Crimea I think and de facto part of Russia now.
There are for sure cities in Russia older than 753. Quite verifiably Derbent's magnificent Naryn-Kala citadel was built in the VI century, and that city has been continuously inhabited cince (and quite a bit of time before, by historic documents - cince about 8th century BCE). While it wasn't Russian for all the time between founding and present day, it was inhabited, and it is located in an uncontested Russian territory (unlike Crimean cities).
This is one of the first quizzes I authored and I haven't looked at expanding or updating it in a long time. But if I ever get around to it I'll see if there's any good data on that.
Gaziantep was first settled in the 4th millennium BC. There is evidence of human settlement around the Bosporus earlier, as early as the 6th millennium BC, however, those ancient neolithic settlements were abandoned after about a thousand years probably due to flooding. Though there would later come to be some primitive settlements in nearby Thrace, the Greek city of Byzantium was not founded until much later, in 660 BC. Gaziantep remained settled and inhabited during this entire period.
So, the idea is good, but depends of what concept of “city” you mean. There isn’t a city called Upper Xingu in Brazil. Xingu is a region between the states of Mato Grosso, Amazonas, and Pará, which figure in one of, if not the biggest indigenous village of the world. The de facto, and officially oldest city in Brazil, is São Vicente, in São Paulo, founded in 1532. Some historians affirm that Cananéia, also in São Paulo, is the oldest one, founded in 1531, and there is this debate until today. Some rumors and legends, tell that Iguape, still in São Paulo, was founded before the Portuguese Arrival. Also, that there were Europeans already living in the region, but officially, was founded in 1538. Anyways, there isn’t any municipality called Upper Xingu, between the 5,568 (5,570 if you consider Fernando de Noronha and Brasília) municipalities of Brazil. São Vicente is the best substitute for this Upper Xingu.
Thanks. IMO this one needs some work... could use an update and a couple corrections, maybe even a small expansion. Though it's already quite difficult and I imagine that's a big reason why it was never featured - making it longer would make it more difficult still. But I made an abridged version that was significantly shorter and easier with the aim of getting a feature and that one never was, either.
After some time, I have realised that many cities that aren't in the quiz were continually inhabited. There's Mexico City/Tenochtitlan, NYC, Philadephia, Boston, Toronto, York, Amsterdam, Mumbai, Beijing, Kyoto, Tokyo, Taipei, maybe Manila, Cairo, Rome, Naples, maybe Marseille, Vienna, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Athens, Istanbul, maybe Dubai, maybe Abu Dhabi, Karachi, Lahore, Kolkata, Chennai and I bet many more. Even if some cities in this list were not continually occupied for their entire lifetime, their current occupation time could get them into the list. I'm also not fully sure of the criteria to get a city here, maybe you could explain in the caveats?
Philadelphia, Boston, New York were all founded later than St Augustine. Gaziantep is about 3000 years older than Byzantium. Athens is already on the quiz. I'm not sure what you're talking about?
This quiz is not meant to include every city in the world over 100 years old if that's what you were thinking... it's the single oldest continuously-inhabited city by each of these countries. Sometimes there's more than one city listed because it was a tie. And, yes, sometimes there were informal temporary settlements, farming communities, or even villages in roughly the same area before a city was founded there; the criteria may not be consistent from place to place, but this was the best data I could find at the time.
Pretty much all of them would be in the Middle East if that was the quiz, and a lot of them would be cities you never heard of before in Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, etc..
I wouldn't assert that Rome is the oldest city in Italy, as there are several other cities with longer histories. For example, according to legend, Padua was founded in 1183 BC, and archaeological remains confirm an early date for the foundation of the town center, between the 11th and 10th centuries BC. Additionally, Matera appears to have been continuously occupied since around 1000 BC, with settlements dating back to the 10th millennium BC.
One might argue that evidence attests to about 10,000 years of human presence in the territory of Rome. However, this raises questions about the accuracy of the traditional founding date of 753 BC.
What I aim to highlight is the complexity and uncertainty inherent in determining the exact founding dates of ancient cities. Often, such determinations rely on historical records and legends that may not be entirely accurate. Thus, it becomes challenging to establish definitively which city holds the title of the oldest city in Italy.
(the city of Worms has a long-running rivalry with Trier regarding which of the two is older. Afaik it's still unclear, maybe you could add Worms as an alternativ solution / type-in? There's also Neuss wanting to be a contender but imho that's just silly.
Source: Am Irish.
There is an abridged easier version here that you would probably get 100% on.
http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/city-history-and-people/page-1
Ribe is the oldest city / town in Denmark as well as in all of Scandinavia.
One might argue that evidence attests to about 10,000 years of human presence in the territory of Rome. However, this raises questions about the accuracy of the traditional founding date of 753 BC.
What I aim to highlight is the complexity and uncertainty inherent in determining the exact founding dates of ancient cities. Often, such determinations rely on historical records and legends that may not be entirely accurate. Thus, it becomes challenging to establish definitively which city holds the title of the oldest city in Italy.
Very good quiz, thought Ribe was older than Argus.
Sad Worms noises
(the city of Worms has a long-running rivalry with Trier regarding which of the two is older. Afaik it's still unclear, maybe you could add Worms as an alternativ solution / type-in? There's also Neuss wanting to be a contender but imho that's just silly.