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1. Concept and historical contextThe Christian term millenarianism is etymologically derived from “millennium” (Latin:  millen(n)ium) – also known as chiliasm (from the Greek  chília, “thousand”), though its roots are within ancient Judaism. It covers a broad spectrum of expectations of salvation taking place in this world rather than in the heavenly afterlife [2]. The idea of a thousand-year interim kingdom unstained by evil, as developed in the Gospel of John, was anticipated by various prophecies in the Hebrew Scriptures (e.g. Isa 24-27, 65…

1. IntroductionDespite the lengthy tradition of research beginning with Max Weber and Georg Simmel, there is still no consensus on what constitutes a town or city in Europe. Given the hyperabundance of settlement forms across the world, the task is simply impossible outside Europe [2]. There is much sense, however, in following Jürgen Osterhammel’s minimal definition: “A ‘town’ is a way of organizing space as a society” [3. 355].Towns and cities formed, each with their own cultures, in almost all regions of the world long before cultural contact (Cultura…