City Plate - Tokyo

Tokyo began as a settlement named Edo (noted in white), which by the mid-1600s was the center of a shogun powerbase that had a nationwide military presence.  In 1869, Emperor Meiji renamed the city and claimed it as the seat of the Japanese Empire.  Twice left in ruins, after the Great Kanto earthquake in 1923 and extensive firebombing in WWII, the city rebuilt itself.  This era of rebirth peaked in the 1980s during its real estate and technology boom.  Tokyo has continued to build upon itself: expanding on top of ruins in an effort to accommodate its extreme population density.