Expert: Maria - 5/25/2004

Question
Do you know what the world population was around 1500bc? Or Egypts?

Answer
First of all I have to point out  that estimates of ancient population figures are mostly more or less educated guesses.

Anyway, according to  Historical Estimates of World Population, we can suppose that the population of Europe, Asia and Africa [ with regard to the part  of Asia and Africa that was then known, at least], amounted to  about 30/ 35  millions of individuals around 1500 BC, though it's very difficult to indicate an exact figure, as there is no historical source about it.

As for Egypt in 1500 BC, i.e. in the  New Kingdom, 18th.dynasty more or less, its population could amount to about  5/10 millions of humans, as far as we know, considering that thousand years later  in the whole Greece  the population must have been about 4 or 5 million people, at the time of Pericles, i.e. in the 5th.century BC.

On the contrary, we know that much later  in the Roman Empire (see below) the population amounted to about 54,000,000.
(See J.Beloch,"Die Bevoelkerung der griechisch-roemischen Welt", Leipzig 1886).

Best regards
Maria
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NOTA BENE.
The Roman Empire which lasted from 2nd.century BC to 5th. century AD was the dominant power in the entire Mediterranean basin, most of Western Europe and large areas of northern Africa, as it comprised many countries from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea, the Red Sea and the Black Sea, i.e. Italy, modern England, Scotland, Portugal, Spain, France,Western Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Hungary, Austria, Jugoslavia, Romania, Albania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Armenia, Syria, Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Israel, Lebanon and Northern Africa from Morocco to Egypt.