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Notes -
Absolutely, the main point does stand. I'm unfamiliar with the French case, but London's role as a central capital of a single polity probably contributes to this phenomenon. London's been an immigrant city (internal migrants) for 600 years, the closest thing to "standard" English is based on the London prestige dialect, which itself was just a variety of that spoken in the East Midlands- the population churn was constant. Prior to 1750 there was basically London, a few market towns, the other national capitals (Dublin really) and that was it for cities. Places like Rome, Milan, Naples, Munich, Cologne etc. were all independent city states, or capitals of smaller polities which later unified, which must have encouraged the decentralised growth.
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