The development of Polish towns in the second half of the ninete-enth century

Abstract

Urbanization (Latin: urbanus – urban) it is the process expressed in urban development, in-crease in their number, widening urban areas and paticipation of the urban population in total population (or participation of population living according to urban pattern). Urbanization is closely bound up and inextricable with the changes of social and cultural and so-called diffusion of urban lifestyle. Cities from antiquity served the following functions: administrative, communications, defense, tourism and recreation, religious places of worship. The massive process of urban development has taken place only during the Industrial Revolution. The transformation from craft production to production based on the manufactories employing thousands of hands to work has provided a significant demand for labor resources, which primarily was coming from rural areas. In the nineteenth century urbanization on the continent occurred very intensely, the slowdown of this process took place only in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.