Ankh-Morpork is a fictional city-state which prominently features in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. Though on first glance, fantasy style medieval, Ankh-Morpork is very much a parody of a modern, multi-cultural metropolis. It may bring to mind London or New York City, several centuries mixed into one, with elements of renaissance Florence (compare the ultra-rational dictator Lord Vetinari who certainly has read or even written himself the Discworld-equivalent of Macchiavelli's "Il Principe"). Pratchett describes this biggest city of Discworld as on the far side of corrupt and polluted, and as subject to outbreaks of comedic violence and brouhaha on a fairly regular basis. Ankh-Morpork is also the mercantile capital of the Discworld. With the proceeding of the series, Ankh-Morpork is more and more portrayed as multi-cultural (which in this case means multi-species, with increasingly prominent populations of creatures such as dwarfs, trolls, and werewolves) and struggling with modern real-world challenges. Even when it is under attack from a dragon, the vegetable carts still have to come in.
In The Art of Discworld Pratchett explains that the city is similar to Tallinn and central Prague, but adds that it has elements of 18th century London, 19th century Seattle and modern New York City. He also states that since the creation of The Streets of Ankh-Morpork, he has tried to ensure that the descriptions of character movements and locations in the books match the Ankh-Morpork map; this has allowed him, and fans of the series, to visualise the story more clearly. Ankh-Morpork is also referred to as "The Great Wahoonie" on occasions, alluding to "The Great Wen" (London), or to "The Big Apple" (New York). It is stated in the novel 'Moving Pictures' that "There's a saying that all roads lead to Ankh-Morpork. And it's wrong. All roads lead away from Ankh-Morpork, but sometimes people walk along them the wrong way". There are also strong parallels with the political structure, economy, social structure, topography and history of the city-state Florence during the Renaissance.
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