This paper examines the population of Syria during the Roman Empire, focusing on the census conducted by Q. Aemilius Secundus. It discusses the uncertainties and inconsistencies in historical demographic estimates, contrasting them with better-documented periods. Alternatives for the population figures are suggested, including a critical evaluation of existing counts and archaeological evidence, ultimately proposing a population range for early 1st century Greater Syria.

The reconstruction of population-levels for ancient cities is a difficult undertaking. Many methods are present in the literature, each with their own (dis)advantages. This paper presents an illustration on the methodological issues encountered in the reconstruction of the population-levels of an ancient city. The city of Corinth is used as an example, since it has a long history of scholarly interest (including demographic) and it is considered to have played a pivotal role in Roman Greece. Excavations at the site of Corinth have revealed a strongly monumentalized site which seems to at least equal its Greek predecessor. In terms of population, Corinth has been estimated as one of the larger cities in Roman Greece. Corinth is therefore a focal point of academic attention for researchers both directly and indirectly involved in its studies.

Cambridge Ancient History volume XI, 2000

The underlying demographic structure of the early Roman empire is only dimly perceptible. By and large we lack not only reliable statistical evidence for general demographic functions, but also the detailed local records that prove invaluable for early modern Europe. What we do have, in abundance, are impressionistic and often moralizing observations by literary sources; but such remarks, as vague and inconsistent as similar statements by modern lay persons, must always be considered suspect unless they can be verified. Anecdotes are of similarly marginal demographic interest. For these reasons we often have no choice but to fall back upon reasonable conjecture: likelihoods, not truths. Further, the Roman empire spanned a vast geographic range, and it endured for centuries. To judge from early modern data, little uniformity can be anticipated of it-considerably less, indeed, than the discussion in this chapter may suggest. Despite these handicaps, a picture is emerging. The Roman empire's demographic structure, to the extent we know it, broadly resembles most populations before the modern demographic transition; in particular, it is close to the norm for pre-modern Mediterranean societies, while displaying no divergences that clearly anticipate the demographic transition. It goes without saying that Rome's demographic structure fundamentally conditioned the economic, social and political institutions of the Roman empire. Roman demography can be approached in two ways. First, the population of the empire and of its regions can be examined for level, increase or decrease, age and sex structure, and so on. Second, population can be broken down into its three major demographic components: mortality, the rate at which members passed out of the population through death; fertility, the rate at which new persons were born into the population; and migration, the rate at which persons entered or left the population through physical relocation. These components jointly determined the general structure and age distribution of the Roman population, as well as its change over time.

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2020

Population matters. Demographic patterns are both a cause and a consequence of human behaviour in other important domains, such as subsistence, cooperation, politics and culture. Demographers interested in contemporary and recent historical populations have rich data at their fingertips; the importance of demography means many interested parties have gathered demographic data, much of which is now readily available for all to explore. Those interested in the demography of the distant past are not so fortunate, given the lack of written records. Nevertheless, the emergence in recent years of a new interest in the demography of ancient populations has seen the development of a range of new methods for piecing together archaeological, skeletal and DNA evidence to reconstruct past population patterns. These efforts have found evidence in support of the view that the relatively low long-term population growth rates of prehistoric human populations, albeit ultimately conditioned by carryi...

The study of the demographic characteristics of the first Mediterranean global network, the Roman Empire, is not an easy task. There are a lot of aspects to consider and an almost equal number of factors affecting them. In addition, the possible sources of information used to be incomplete and biased. Although methodology for conducting this kind of studies has evolved through time, allowing us to extract and to interpret the data in a better way, some aspects remain still obscure. [Contrib Sci

Demography in Archaeology is a review of current theory and method in the reconstruction of populations from archaeological data. Starting with a summary of demographic concepts and methods, the book examines historical and ethnographic sources of demographic evidence before addressing the methods by which reliable demographic estimates can be made from skeletal remains, settlement evidence and modern and ancient biomolecules. Recent debates in palaeodemography are evaluated, new statistical methods for palaeodemographic reconstruction are explained, and the notion that past demographic structures and processes were substantially different from those pertaining today is critiqued. The book covers a wide span of evidence, from the evolutionary background of human demography to the influence of natural and human-induced catastrophes on population growth and survival. This is essential reading for any archaeologist or anthropologist with an interest in relating the results of field and laboratory studies to broader questions of population structure and dynamics.

Human Biology, 2009

papers.ssrn.com, 2011

Abstract: This paper presents the data and the methods available to estimate the number of Greeks immigrating and settling in Ptolemaic Egypt. I shall argue that the evaluations generally proposed (10% of Greeks) are too high and the flow of immigration implicitly expected too regular. ...

The historicity of the famous United Monarchy of the Bible is hotly debated in recent years, and various arguments have been raised for and against the existence of the kingdom of David and Solomon. One of the strongest arguments raised by those who object to the historicity of such a kingdom lies in demography. Finkelstein and Silberman have recently suggested that the population size of Judah during the supposed time of King David was as small as five thousand, and such a low figure could not have been the core of a real state. While the latter correlation can be and has been disputed, this article questions the data itself showing that the figures suggested by Finkelstein and Silberman cannot be reconciled with more reliable sets of data regarding pre-industrial demography in general and the paleodemography of the region in particular.

Medical History

in: Bagnall, R. S. et al. (2012) The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, Malden, MA, Wiley-Blackwell.

This is a prefinal version of a critical bibliography published with Oxford University Press as: Hin, S. (2015) ‘Ancient Demography’, in: Clayman, D. L. (ed.) Oxford Bibliographies in Classics. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 30. Online publication. DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195389661-0208. See for the final version: http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195389661/obo-9780195389661-0208.xml

Demography in Archaeology is a review of current theory and method in the reconstruction of populations from archaeological data. Starting with a summary of demographic concepts and methods, the book examines historical and ethnographic sources of demographic evidence before addressing the methods by which reliable demographic estimates can be made from skeletal remains, settlement evidence and modern and ancient biomolecules. Recent debates in palaeodemography are evaluated, new statistical methods for palaeodemographic reconstruction are explained, and the notion that past demographic structures and processes were substantially different from those pertaining today is critiqued. The book covers a wide span of evidence, from the evolutionary background of human demography to the influence of natural and human-induced catastrophes on population growth and survival. This is essential reading for any archaeologist or anthropologist with an interest in relating the results of field and laboratory studies to broader questions of population structure and dynamics.

Journal of Early Modern Studies

The origins of demography as a scientific discipline are usually seen as intimately connected to the organisational and economic needs of the early modern state. This paper, by contrast, presents an early demographic enterprise that falls outside this framework. The calculations performed by the Italian Jesuit Giovanni Battista Riccioli in an appendix to his Geographia et hydrographia reformata ("Geography and hydrography brought up to date," 1661) are the first systematic attempt presently known to arrive at an estimate of the entire world population. Yet they appear to have no political purpose and rather belong to a learned, bookish tradition of demographical thinking that may be termed "humanist". The article starts from a summary of Riccioli's life, of the book wherein his demographic exercise is contained and of this exercise itself. Thereafter, Riccioli's motives, sources, methodology and results are discussed. By way of conclusion, some preliminary reflections on the place of Riccioli and the humanist tradition in the early modern history of demography as a whole are offered. Two appendices present a translation of the Coniectura and tabulate its literary sources in order to provide some possible starting points for a study of the aforementioned tradition.

Archaeology and Historical Demography, 2023

The Journal of Roman Studies, 1994

The importance of Beloch's Bevolkerung dergriechisch-romischen Welt and its influence on subsequent research in ancient demography can hardly be overstated. This book represents the key-stone of all modern investigation on size, structure, and, to a certain extent, dynamics of ancient populations. It was the first overall scientific treatment of the subject and it is still unparalleled in its scope. An attempt at its critical evaluation is not just an historiographical exercise: we must come to terms with Beloch's Bev6lkerung, because its detailed treatment of most of the topics concerning the population of the ancient world is at the root of all modern debates and controversies. As Beloch himself pointed out more than once, the strength of the Bev8lkerung lies in its internal consistency, in the attempt to build from a sparse and rarely reliable source-material an overview of the demographic conditions of the ancient world in which 'tout se tient'. In this paper, I argue that the strength of the Bevolkerung is also its weakness: the whole construction rests on a simple argument from likelihood, which turns out to be, on a more thorough and demographically elaborate analysis, less than plausible. I will set out first the background of Beloch's intellectual formation and of his interest in ancient population (i), the development of his investigations leading to the composition of the Bevolkerung (ii), the tight conceptual links that bind together its structure (III). Then I will look once again at what appears to be the key-stone of the Bevolkerung, Beloch's interpretation of the Augustan census figures, and at the way in which this interpretation seems to condition Beloch's appreciation of almost every piece of evidence on the size of ancient populations (iv). I will maintain that no philological argument can be taken to confirm Beloch's view and indeed that philological arguments militate strongly against it (v). After reviewing the use that has been made of the model life tables and model stable populations in historical demography and even by ancient historians in order to make reasonable assumptions on the age and sex composition of ancient populations (vi and vii), by employing them I will test the alleged demographic plausibility of Beloch's interpretation of the leap between the Republican and the Augustan census figures (viii). The acknowledgement of the implausibility of Beloch's solution seems to undermine the whole fabric of the Bevolkerung and the full range of its estimates of the size of ancient populations, but I argue that it would be wrong to abandon the field covered by Beloch and give up every attempt at evaluating the size of an ancient population (ix).

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

In recent years, the adoption of key concepts and models of modern population studies has greatly advanced our understanding of the demography of the Greco-Roman world. Epigraphic evidence has made a vital contribution to this development: statistical analysis of tens of thousands of tombstone inscriptions has generated new insights into mortality regimes, marriage practices, and family structures in various parts of the ancient Mediterranean. In conjunction with papyrological material, these data permit us to identify regional differences and facilitate long-term comparisons with more recent historical populations. After a brief survey of the principal sources of demographic information about the classical world, this paper focuses on the use of inscriptions in the study of population size, mortality, fertility, nuptiality, sex ratios, family formation, and household organization. © Walter Scheidel. scheidel@stanford.edu 1 Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1096436

Archaeology and Historical Demography. Methods and Case Studies between Mediterranean and Central Europe, 2023

The volume publishes the contributions of two seminars, one held in Goettingen in June 2022 and the other in Palermo in October 2022. Methodological aspects and case studies are taken into consideration from Central Europe to Gaul, Italy, Sicily, Greece and Asia Minor. Each of them addresses the problem of the contribution that excavation and archaeological survey data can give to ancient demography. The seminars were funded by the Deutschen akademischen Austauschdienst.

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