Source Data Reference for:

City = Damascus
Time = -1000

City	Year	Size	Size Comment	Year Comment	Author	Title	Location
Damascus	-1500		founded	2nd millenium BC	n/a	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_by_time_of_continuous_habitation	eng2013
Damascus	-1275	7,500			Colin McEvedy	The New Penguin Atlas of Ancient History ISBN 978-0140-51348-6	p45
Aram	-1000	10,000	"10,000 or more"		George Modelski	World Cities -3000 to 2000	p33
Damascus	-850	28,800		btw 859 amd 824 BC	Tertius Chandler	Four thousand years of urban growth	p97