Its population is officially estimated at 1. The city area measures km 2 93 sq mi and comprises 6 districts Sectoare , while the metropolitan area covers 1, km 2 sq mi. Bucharest is a major cultural, political and economic hub, and the country's seat of government. Bucharest was first mentioned in documents in The city became the capital in and is the centre of Romanian media, culture, and art. Its architecture is a mix of historical mostly Eclectic , but also Neoclassical and Art Nouveau , interbellum Bauhaus , Art Deco , and Romanian Revival architecture , socialist era , and modern.
In the period between the two World Wars, the city's elegant architecture and the sophistication of its elite earned Bucharest the nicknames of Little Paris or Paris of the East. In recent years, the city has been experiencing an economic and cultural boom.
In January , there were 1. In , Bucharest was the European city with the highest growth of tourists who stay over night, according to the Mastercard Global Index of Urban Destinations. Economically, Bucharest is the most prosperous city in Romania and the richest capital and city in the region, having surpassed Budapest since Tradition connects the founding of Bucharest with the name of Bucur , who was a prince, an outlaw, a fisherman, a shepherd or a hunter, according to different legends.
In Romanian , the word stem bucurie means 'joy' 'happiness' , [ 21 ] hence the city Bucharest means 'city of joy'. In , Austrian historian Franz Sulzer claimed that it was related to bucurie joy , bucuros joyful , or a se bucura to be joyful , while an early 19th-century book published in Vienna assumed its name to be derived from 'Bukovie', a beech forest. Bucharest's history alternated periods of development and decline from the early settlements in antiquity until its consolidation as the national capital of Romania late in the 19th century.
Under subsequent rulers, Bucharest was established as the summer residence of the royal court. The city was partly destroyed by natural disasters and rebuilt several times during the following years. The Wallachian uprising initiated by Tudor Vladimirescu led to the end of the rule of Constantinople Greeks in Bucharest. In β14 the city was hit by Caragea's plague. The city was wrested from Ottoman influence and occupied at several intervals by the Habsburg monarchy , , and Imperial Russia three times between and It was placed under Russian administration between and the Crimean War , with an interlude during the Bucharest-centred Wallachian revolution.
