Varying “mountain” to form “town” i.e. from a defensible hill to a defensible city is fundamental and found throughout indo-european languages.
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=town
Evidently the first European cities were founded on defensible hills, which is why I stressed the distinction. E.g. Russian “gor” mountain “gorod” city. English burrough/burrow (burrows are found in hills). I can do this for any Indo-European language I know,
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=burrow
So the distinction is very likely somehow part of proto-indo european.
丘 山 岗 in contrast do not appear to have a direct relation to 城 in Chinese
Likewise this distinction doesn’t appear to be the case of Estonian or Hungarian, which are Finno-Ugric languages.
http://amazon.com/author/quizmaster