The population of the region of Palestine, which approximately corresponds to modern Israel, the Palestinian territories and Jordan, has varied in both size and ethnic composition throughout its history.
The following table shows the total population and that of the main ethno-religious groups living in the area from the First Century CE up until the last full calendar year of the British Mandate, 1947.
Note: Figures prior to the 1500s are all only estimates by researchers. For some periods, there are multiple researchers who have made differing estimates. None should be taken as exact numbers, and further context and detail is available by following links to the full description on Wikipedia as well as links to the original information sources.
conflicting: some estimates conflict among different researchers |
---|
Year | Source | Jewish | Pagan | Samar- itan[1] |
Chris-tian | Muslim | Total | Driving events |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
0–100 (1st c.) CE |
Bachi[2] | Majority | ... | n/a | 1,000– 2,500 [3] |
| ||
140 CE† | Avi- Yohan [11] |
conflicting; 700-800 |
... | conflicting; "far fewer than 300,000" |
... | n/a | conflicting; 2,500 | |
Broshi [11] |
conflicting | conflicting | n/a | conflicting; <1,000 ("never more than 1 million") | ||||
Early 300s | Stem- berger [11] |
Largest group |
2nd- largest |
3rd- largest |
Smallest group |
n/a | ... |
|
300s | Bachi | Majority | ... | ... | Minority | n/a | "More than in 1st c." [13][14] | |
400s | Bachi | Minority | n/a | ... | Majority | n/a | ||
500s | n/a | ... | n/a | |||||
628 | Butler, Gil | >250 [15] |
30-80 | 520-570 | >950 | |||
630s | Parkes | 150– 400 |
n/a | ... | ... | ... |
| |
700s | n/a | ... |
| |||||
800s | n/a | ... |
| |||||
900s | n/a | ... | ||||||
1095 | Ellen- blum, Della- Pergola Broshi |
n/a | ... | 400– 560 |
| |||
End 1100s |
Bachi | Minority | n/a | ... | Minority | Majority | >225 | |
1300s | Bachi | Minority | n/a | ... | Minority | Majority | 150 | |
1533-9 | Bachi | 5 | n/a | ... | 6 | 145 | 156 | |
1553-4 | Bachi | 7 | n/a | ... | 9 | 188 | 205 | |
1690-1 | Bachi | 2 | n/a | <0.2 | 11 | 219 | 232 | |
1800 | Bachi | 7 | n/a | <0.2 | 22 | 246 | 275 |
|
1890 | Bachi | conflicting; 43 |
n/a | <0.2 | conflicting; 57 |
conflicting; 432 |
conflicting; 532 |
|
1890-1 | Ottoman census | conflicting; 18 |
n/a | <0.2 | conflicting; 52 |
conflicting; 446 |
conflicting; 516 |
|
1914 | Bachi | 94 | n/a | <0.2 | 70 | 525 | 689 |
|
1914-5 | Ottoman census | 39 | n/a | <0.2 | 81 | 602 | 722 |
|
1922 | British census | 84 | n/a | <0.2 | 71 | 589 | 752 |
|
1931 | Bachi | 175 | n/a | <0.2 | 89 | 760 | 1,033 |
|
1947 | Bachi | 630 | n/a | <0.2 | 143 | 1,181 | 1,970 |
‡including what is today the Kingdom of Jordan
Table 2
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: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
The evidence concerning the Jewish community comes mainly from the Geniza documents, dating mainly from the eleventh and twelfth centuries, where there is one famous event in which forced mass conversion of Jews and Christians took place: this is the persecution of the Fatimid caliph al-Hakim (1009). Apart from that, although there is evidence of numerous cases of individual conversions, as Goitein remarks: "conversion to Islam was not widespread during the classical Geniza period". (Drawing on Goltein (1971) A Mediterranean Society, vol. 2, p.300 and (1978) A Mediterranean Society, vol. 3, p. 290)