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Lille ( LEEL; French: [lil] (listen); Dutch: Rijsel [ˈrɛisəl]; Picard: Lile; West Flemish: Rysel) is a city at the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the Deûle River, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France region, the prefecture of the Nord department, and the main city of the Métropole Européenne de Lille.
As of 2017, Lille had a population of 232,787 within its administrative limits, and Lille is the first city of the Métropole Européenne de Lille with a population of 1,146,320, making it the fourth-largest urban area in France after Paris, Lyon, and Marseille. More broadly, it belongs to a vast conurbation formed with the Belgian cities of Mouscron, Kortrijk, Tournai and Menin, which gave birth in January 2008 to the Eurometropole Lille-Kortrijk-Tournai, the first European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation (EGTC), which has more than 2.1 million inhabitants.
Nicknamed in France the "Capital of Flanders", Lille and its surroundings belong to the historical region of Romance Flanders, a former territory of the county of Flanders that is not part of the linguistic area of West Flanders. A garrison town (as evidenced by its Citadel), Lille has had an eventful history from the Middle Ages to the French Revolution. Very often besieged during its history, it belonged successively to the Kingdom of France, the Burgundian State, the Holy Roman Empire of Germany and the Spanish Netherlands before being definitively attached to the France of Louis XIV following the War of Spanish Succession along with the entire territory making up the historic province of French Flanders. Lille was still under siege in 1792 during the Franco-Austrian War, in 1914 and 1940.
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Houston ( (listen) HEW-stən) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas, fourth most populous city in the United States, most populous city in the Southern United States, as well as the sixth most populous in North America, with an estimated 2019 population of 2,320,268. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the seat of Harris County and the principal city of the Greater Houston metropolitan area, which is the fifth most populous metropolitan statistical area in the United States and the second most populous in Texas after the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, with a population of 7,066,141 in 2019.Comprising a total area of 637.4 square miles (1,651 km2), Houston is the eighth most expansive city in the United States (including consolidated city-counties). It is the largest city in the United States by total area, whose government is not consolidated with that of a county, parish or borough. Though primarily in Harris County, small portions of the city extend into Fort Bend and Montgomery counties, bordering other principal communities of Greater Houston such as Sugar Land and The Woodlands.
The city of Houston was founded by land investors on August 30, 1836, at the confluence of Buffalo Bayou and White Oak Bayou (a point now known as Allen's Landing) and incorporated as a city on June 5, 1837. The city is named after former General Sam Houston, who was president of the Republic of Texas and had won Texas's independence from Mexico at the Battle of San Jacinto 25 miles (40 km) east of Allen's Landing. After briefly serving as the capital of the Texas Republic in the late 1830s, Houston grew steadily into a regional trading center for the remainder of the 19th century.The arrival of the 20th century saw a convergence of economic factors which fueled rapid growth in Houston, including a burgeoning port and railroad industry, the decline of Galveston as Texas's primary port following a devastating 1900 hurricane, the subsequent construction of the Houston Ship Channel, and the Texas oil boom.
Toulon (UK: , US: , French: [tulɔ̃]; Provençal: Tolon (classical norm), Touloun (Mistralian...
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Mulhouse (pronounced [myluz]; Alsatian: Milhüsa or Milhüse, [mɪlˈyːzə]; German: Mülhausen;...