Geography
Ankh-Morpork lies on the River Ankh (the most polluted waterway on the Discworld and reputedly solid enough to walk on), where the fertile loam of the Sto Plains (similar to Western Europe) meets the Circle Sea (the Discworld's version of the Mediterranean). This, naturally, puts it in an excellent trading position.
Lying approximately equidistant from the cold Hub and tropical Rim, Ankh-Morpork is in the Discworld's equivalent of the temperate zone.
The name "Ankh-Morpork" refers to both the city itself, a walled city about a mile (1.6 km) across, and the surrounding suburbs and farms of its fiefdom.
The central city divides more or less into the more affluent Ankh and the poorer Morpork which includes the slum-like "Shades", which are separated by the River Ankh.
Ankh-Morpork is built on black loam, broadly, but is mostly built on itself; pragmatic citizens simply built on top of the existing buildings when the sediment grew too high as the river flooded, rather than excavate them out. There are many unknown basements, including an entire "cave network" below Ankh-Morpork made up of old streets and abandoned sewers (it has been continuously stated that anyone with a pickaxe and a good sense of direction could reach anywhere in Ankh-Morpork by knocking walls down in a straight line). Recently, the underground regions have been extended by the city's dwarf population to get around unimpeded. It has recently been made municipal property.
Ankh-Morpork is also the city with the most dwarfs on the whole disc outside of Überwald, largely considered the dwarfen homeland, with over 50,000 dwarfs living there (The Truth, The Fifth Elephant).
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