Over time (decades and even centuries) is observed a rather strong persistency of structural properties (relative size and spacing, functional diversity and complementarity) of the European system of cities. We can explain this long sustainability of European cities through two major aspects of their dynamics that are emphasized in the evolutionary theory of urban systems. The first is the generic adaptive process that is linked to the spatial and hierarchical diffusion of innovations. This is revealed by century’s long urban growth patterns and fluctuations that have similarities with the stochastic Gibrat’s model, and by the recent evolution in scaling laws of economic attributes corresponding to the globalization of urban activities. The second process is an historical path dependence that is linked with the configuration of interaction networks between cities and their regional environments. Differentiated models of territorial governance, border effects and geopolitical contexts including temporal barriers and cohesion policies are possible explanatory factors of these historical traces in the urban evolution. These dynamic trends may be considered by stakeholders in local and regional policies for ensuring the viability of such an urban geodiversity in the future.