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This chapter aims to address the emergence of Baghdad and the phases of its morphology and transformation. The first era began with the Round City; this originated the first nucleus that later formed Baghdad. The historical parts of most Middle Eastern old cities usually occupy polar places in relation to the rest of their city zones. These historical centres can give a city its own identity and embody exceptional urban assets, if carefully maintained and managed. In this chapter, there are two significant periods, the Abbasid Empire and post-Abbasid Empire. One of the main concerns is the conflict between two trends, old fabric as a traditional pattern and modern thoughts and, consequently, how that could affect in formulating the development plan.

Morphological theories shape the leading platform to theoretically and practically consider the assets connected with the emergence of the city, and its growth and development over time. In this paper, five elements of the urban form are typified: structure/tissue, plot, building, block, and the street pattern will be addressed. Understanding the urban form at the different levels within its ingredients could lead to shape a base launch of how to consider the potentiality of the development and sustainability of a particular area.

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Urban morphological approach (concepts and practices) plays a significant role in forming our cities not only in terms of theoretical perspective but also in how to practice and experience the urban form structures over time. Urban morphology has been focused on studying the processes of formation and transformation of urban form based on its historical development. The main purpose of this study is to explore and describe the existing literature of this approach and thus aiming to summarize the most important studies that put into understanding the city form. In this regard, there were three schools of urban morphological studies, namely: the British, the Italian, and the French School. A reflective comparison between the three schools has been conducted in order to recognize the main critical points among them. Therefore, a theoretical framework is derived.