EN
The paper discusses general regularities which determine the relationships between nature and human settlement in respect of urban settlement and the primary physio-geographic boundaries. The study looks at the relations between the mountains and the foothills boundary and the distribution and development of cities in the Ukrainian Carpathians over the span of the last thousand years. In the successive periods, the role of the analysed boundaries in the development processes was subject to distinct changes. While the defence function was losing in importance, new functions appeared such as the tourist function. The author's analysis corroborates the hypothesis that the high-rank physio-geographic boundaries such as e.g. premontane gradient zone, have played (and still play) a considerable role in the processes of city location and development.