With a population of 1,, inhabitants as of 30 November , [ 3 ] it is the third-largest city by population in Germany , after Berlin and Hamburg , and thus the largest which does not constitute its own state, as well as the 11th-largest city in the European Union.
The Munich metropolitan area — including suburbs and satellite towns — has 3 million inhabitants; and the city's metropolitan region is home to about 6. Straddling the banks of the river Isar north of the Alps , Munich is the seat of the Bavarian administrative region of Upper Bavaria , while being the most densely populated municipality in Germany with 4, people per km 2.
Munich is the second-largest city in the Bavarian dialect area , after the Austrian capital of Vienna. The city was first mentioned in Catholic Munich strongly resisted the Reformation and was a political point of divergence during the resulting Thirty Years' War , but remained physically untouched despite an occupation by the Protestant Swedes.
In , during the German Revolution of —19 , the ruling House of Wittelsbach , which had governed Bavaria since , was forced to abdicate in Munich and a short-lived Bavarian Soviet Republic was declared.
In the s, Munich became home to several political factions, among them the Nazi Party. After the Nazis' rise to power, Munich was declared their "Capital of the Movement".
