[NirAntae]

Per the manual, "Please note, you can have up to 10 arable hexes max. There is currently no limit on wilderness hexes."  Populated hexes show up separately from both arable and wilderness hexes.

Do populated hexes count towards your 10 total hexes, or not? 

(I can see it making sense either way...  since that would essentially make the cities a single 'hex'...)

[Mithril]

For the purpose of determining limits and such, Populated hexes are interchangeable with Arable hexes. So yes, they count towards your 10 total hexes same as Arable.

[Lara]

Wiki Check and updated to clarify that Populated hexes function like arable hexes, not like wilderness