This document specifies a descriptive framework for a city including an associated foundational ontology of the anatomical structure of a city or community. The descriptive framework is intended to have the following qualities:

— timeless, i.e. compatible with any human settlement at any time in history;

— acultural, i.e. valid for any culture and any type of city;

— scalable, i.e. valid for a metropolis, a city, a small town or a village;

— generic, so that everything we could define as a "human settlement", such as a "smart city", has a place in this structure.