Medieval Population.
Much has been written upon the population of medieval London, but
little certainty has resulted therefrom. We know the size of London at
different periods and are able to guess to some extent as to the
number of its inhabitants, but most of the figures which have come
down to us are mere guesses. The results of the poll-tax have often
been considered as trustworthy substitutes for population returns, but
Professor Oman has shown that little trust can be placed in these
results. As an instance he states that the commissioners of the
poll-tax reported that there were only two-thirds as many
contributaries in 1381 as in 1377. The adult population of the realm
had ostensibly fallen from 1,355,201 to 896,481. These figures were
monstrous and incredible.[10]
The Bills of Mortality of the 16th and 17th centuries are of more
value, and they have been considered and revised by such able
statisticians as John Graunt and Sir William Petty. It was not,
however, before the 19th century that accurate figures were
obtainable. The circuit of the walls of London which were left by the
Romans was never afterwards enlarged, and the population did not
overflow into the suburbs to any extent until the Tudor period.
Population was practically stationary for centuries owing to
pestilences and the large proportion of deaths among infants. We have
no materials to judge of the number of inhabitants before the Norman
Conquest, but we can guess that there were many open spaces within the
walls that were afterwards filled up. It is scarcely worth while to
guess as to the numbers in Saxon London, but it is possible that in
the early period there were about 10,000 inhabitants, growing later to
about 20,000. During the latter part of the Saxon period the numbers
of the population of the country began to decay; this decay, however,
was arrested by the Norman Conquest. The population increased during
ten peaceful years of Henry III., and increased slowly until the death
of Edward II., and then it began to fall off, and continued to
decrease during the period of the Wars of the Roses and of the Barons
until the accession of the first Tudor monarch. The same causes that
operated to bring about these changes in the whole kingdom were of
course also at work in the case of the City of London.
One of the earliest statements as to the population of London occurs
in a letter of about the year 1199 written to Pope Innocent III. by
Peter of Blois, then archdeacon of London, and therefore a man of some
authority on the subject. He states that the City contained 120 parish
churches and 40,000 inhabitants. These numbers have been very
generally accepted as fairly correct, and Dr Creighton[11] comes to
the conclusion after careful consideration that the population of
London from the reign of Richard I. to that of Henry VII. varied
within a limit of about forty to fifty thousand inhabitants.
Plagues and Mortality.
Dr Creighton points out that the number given by certain chroniclers
of the deaths from the early pestilences in London are incredible;
such for instance as the statement that forty or fifty thousand bodies
were buried in Charterhouse churchyard at the time of the Black Death
in 1348-1349. These numbers have been taken as a basis for calculation
of population, and one statistician reasoned that if 50,000 were
buried in one churchyard 100,000 should represent the whole mortality
of London. If this were allowed the population at this time must have
been at least 200,000, an impossible amount.
Although the mortality caused by the different plagues had a great
effect upon the population of the country at large the city soon
recovered the losses by reason of the numbers who came to London from
outside in hopes of obtaining work. Although there were fluctuations
in the numbers at different periods there is evidence to show that on
the average the amount of forty to fifty thousand fixed by Dr
Creighton for the years between 1189 and 1509 is fairly correct. The
medieval period closed with the accession of the Tudor dynasty, and
from that time the population of London continued to increase, in
spite of attempts by the government to prevent it. One of the first
periods of increase was after the dissolution of the religious houses;
another period of increase was after the Restoration.
Bills of Mortality.
A proclamation was issued in 1580 prohibiting the erection within 3 m.
of the city gates of any new houses or tenements "where no former
house hath been known to have been." In a subsequent proclamation
Queen Elizabeth commanded that only one family should live in one
house, that empty houses erected within seven years were not to be let
and that unfinished buildings on new foundations were to be pulled
down. In spite of these restrictions London continued to grow. James
I. and Charles I. were filled with the same fear of the increasing
growth of London. In 1630 a similar proclamation to that of 1580 was
published. During the greater part of the 18th century there was a
serious check to the increase of population, but at the end of the
century a considerable increase occurred, and in the middle of the
19th century the enormous annual increase became particularly marked.
To return to the 16th century when the Bills of Mortality came into
existence.[12] Mention is made of these bills as early as 1517, but
the earliest series now known dates from 1532. Dr Creighton had access
to the manuscript returns of burials and christenings for five years
from 1578 to 1582 preserved in the library at Hatfield House. The
history of the Bills of Mortality which in the early years were
intermittent in their publication is of much interest, and Dr
Creighton has stated it with great clearness. The Company of Parish
Clerks is named in an ordinance of 1581 (of which there is a copy in
the Record Office) as the body responsible for the bills, and their
duties were then said to be "according to the Order in that behalf
heretofore provided." John Bell, clerk to the company, who wrote an
essay during the great plague of 1665, had no records in his office of
an earlier date than 1593, and he was not aware that his company had
been engaged in registering births and deaths before that year. The
fire of 1666 destroyed all the documents of the Parish Clerks Company,
and in its hall in Silver Street only printed tables from about the
year 1700 are to be found. There is a set of Annual Bills from 1658
(with the exception of the years 1756 to 1764) in the library of the
British Museum.[13]
These bills were not analysed and general results obtained from them
until 1662, when Captain John Graunt first published his valuable
_Natural and Political Observations upon the Bills of Mortality_. Sir
William Petty followed with his important inquiries upon the
population (_Essay on Political Arithmetic_, 1683).
It is not worth while to refer to all the wild guesses that were made
by various writers, but Dr Creighton shows the absurdity of one of
these calculations made in 1554 by Soranzo, the Venetian ambassador
for the information of the doge and senators of Venice. He estimates
the population to have been 180,000 persons, which Dr Creighton
affirms to be nearly three times the number that we obtain by a
moderate calculation from the bills of mortality in 1532 and 1535.
Population in 16th and 17th centuries.
Following on his calculations from 1509, when the population may be
supposed to have been about 50,000, Dr Creighton carries on his
numbers to the Restoration in the following table:--
1532-1535 62,400 | 1605 224,275
1563 93,276 | 1622 272,207
1580 123,034 | 1634 339,824
1593-1595 152,478 | 1661 460,000
The numbers for 1661 are those arrived at by Graunt, and they are just
about half the population given authoritatively in the first census
1801 (864,845). It therefore took 140 years to double the numbers,
while in 1841 the numbers of 1801 were more than doubled.
These numbers were arrived at with much care and may be considered as
fairly accurate although some other calculations conflict with a few
of the figures. The first attempt at a census was in August 1631 when
the lord mayor returned the number of mouths in the city of London and
Liberties at 130,268, which is only about half the number given above.
This is accounted for by the larger area contained in the bills of
mortality compared with that containing only the city and its
liberties.[14] Howell's suggestion that the population of London in
1631 was a million and a half need only be mentioned as a specimen of
the wildest of guesses.
18th century.
Petty's numbers for 1682 are 670,000 and those of Gregory King for
1696, 530,000. The latter are corroborated by those of 1700, which are
given as 550,000. Maitland gives the numbers in 1737 as 725,903. with
regard to the relative size of great cities Petty affirms that before
the Restoration the people of Paris were more in number than those of
London and Dublin, whereas in 1687 the people of London were more than
those of Paris and Rome or of Paris and Rouen.
It is not necessary to give any further numbers for the population of
the 18th century, as that has been already stated to have been almost
stationary. This is proved by Gregory King's figures for 1696
(530,000) when compared with those of the first census for 1801
(864,035). A corroboration is also to be found in the report of the
first census for 1801, where a calculation is made of the probable
population of the years 1700 and 1750. These are given respectively as
674,350 and 676,250. These figures include (1) the City of London
within and (2) without the walls, (3) the City and Liberties of
Westminster, (4) the outparishes within the bills of mortality and (5)
the parishes not within the bills of mortality. No. 5 is given as 9150
in 1700, and 22,350 in 1750. It is curious to find that already in the
18th century a considerable reduction in the numbers of the city of
London is supposed to have taken place, as is seen in the following
figures:--
1700. 1750.
City of London within the walls 139,300 87,000
" " without the walls 69,000 57,300
As the increase in Westminster is not great (130,000 in 1700 and
152,000 in 1750) and there is little difference in the totals it will
be seen that the amount is chiefly made up by the increase in the
parishes without the bills of mortality. The extraordinary growth of
London did not come into existence until about the middle of the 19th
century (see § IV. above).