Medina | |
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Medina, officially Al Madinah Al Munawwarah (Arabic: المدينة المنورة, romanized: al-Madinat al-Munawwarah, lit. 'The Enlightened City'), commonly simplified as Madīnah or Madinah, is one of the three holiest cities in Islam and the capital of the Medina Region of Saudi Arabia. The 2020 estimated population of the city is 1,488,782, making it the fourth-most populous city in the country. Located at the core of the Madinah Province in the western reaches of the country, the city is distributed over 589 square kilometers (227 square miles), 293 km2 (117 sq. mi.) of which constitutes the city's urban area, while the rest is occupied by the Hejaz mountain range, empty valleys, agricultural spaces, older dormant volcanoes and the Nafud desert.
The city is considered to be the second-holiest of three cities in Islamic tradition, the other two being Mecca and Jerusalem. The Masjid al-Nabawi ('Prophet's Mosque') built by Muhammad in 622 CE, is of exceptional importance in Islam and is the site of burial of the last Islamic prophet. Muslims visit his rawdhah in what is known as Ziyarat at least once in their lifetime, although this is not obligatory. The original name of the city before the advent of Islam was Yathrib and it is referred to by the same name in the Qur'an in Chapter 33, al-Ahzab (The Confederates). It was renamed Madīnat an-Nabī (City of the Prophet or The Prophet's City) after Muhammad's death and later al-Madinah al-Munawwarah (The Enlightened City), before being simplified and shortened to its modern name, Madinah (The City), written in English as Medina. Saudi Arabian road signage uses Madinah and al-Madinah al-Munawwarah interchangeably.The city is known to have existed for over 1500 years before Muhammad's migration from Mecca, otherwise known as the Hijrah.
Vienna | |
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Vienna ( (listen); German: Wien [viːn] (listen)) is the national capital, largest city, and one of nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's most populous city, with about 1.9 million inhabitants (2.6 million within the metropolitan area, nearly one third of the country's population), and its cultural, economic, and political center. It is the 6th-largest city by population within city limits in the European Union.
Until the beginning of the 20th century, Vienna was the largest German-speaking city in the world, and before the splitting of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in World War I, the city had 2 million inhabitants. Today, it is the second-largest German-speaking city after Berlin. Vienna is host to many major international organizations, including the United Nations, OPEC and the OSCE. The city is located in the eastern part of Austria and is close to the borders of the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. These regions work together in a European Centrope border region. Along with nearby Bratislava, Vienna forms a metropolitan region with 3 million inhabitants. In 2001, the city center was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In July 2017 it was moved to the list of World Heritage in Danger. Additionally to being known as the "City of Music" due to its musical legacy, as many famous classical musicians such as Beethoven and Mozart who called Vienna home. Vienna is also said to be the "City of Dreams", because of it being home to the world's first psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. Vienna's ancestral roots lie in early Celtic and Roman settlements that transformed into a Medieval and Baroque city. It is well known for having played a pivotal role as a leading European music center, from the age of Viennese Classicism through the early part of the 20th century.