Birmingham

Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands, England. Birmingham is the largest of England's core cities, and is considered by some to be the United Kingdom's second city. The city's reputation was forged as a powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution in Britain, a fact which led to Birmingham being known as "the workshop of the world" or the "city of a thousand trades".

The City of Birmingham has a population of 1,001,200 (2005 estimate). It forms part of the larger West Midlands conurbation, which has a population of 2,294,093 (2001 census) and includes several neighbouring towns and cities, such as Solihull, Wolverhampton and the towns of the Black Country.

People from Birmingham are known as 'Brummies', a term derived from the city's nickname of Brum. This comes in turn from the city's dialect name, Brummagem, which is derived from an earlier name of the city, 'Bromwicham'. There is a distinctive Brummie dialect (distinct vocabulary and syntax) and accent (way of speaking), both of which differ from those of the adjacent Black Country.

Birmingham is situated just to the west of the geographical centre of England on the Birmingham Plateau - an area of relatively high ground, ranging around 150-200 metres above sea level and crossed by Britain's main north-south watershed between the basins of the Rivers Severn and Trent.

To the south and west of the city lie the Lickey Hills, Clent Hills and Walton Hill, which reach 315 metres (1,033 ft) and have good views over the city.

Geologically Birmingham is dominated by the Birmingham Fault which runs diagonally through the city from the Lickey Hills in the south west, passing through Edgbaston, the Bull Ring and Erdington, to Sutton Coldfield in the north east. To the south and east of the fault the ground is largely softer Keuper Marl, interspersed with beds of Bunter pebbles and crossed by the valleys of the Rivers Tame, Rea and Cole and their tributaries. To the north and west of the fault, varying from 45-180 metres (150-600 ft) higher than the surrounding area and underlying much of the city centre, lies a long ridge of harder Keuper Sandstone.

Much of the area now occupied by the city was originally a northern reach of the ancient Forest of Arden, whose former presence can still be felt in the city's dense oak tree-cover and in the large number of districts (eg Moseley, Saltley, Hockley) with names ending in "-ley", an Anglo-Saxon word meaning "woodland clearing".