Putting Population in Perspective

My how we’ve grown! Getting ready for Egypt~!

This is the fourth in a series of posts about Egypt, in preparation for our visit there in January, 2025, only ten days until departure!

We will be landing in Cairo just after midnight on New Year’s Eve! I know it will be a cultural shock for us midwesterners. In preparation, I geeked out on statistics.

Credit: Creative Commons

Egypt has a population of 117,000,000 (2024), with most people (95%) living along the Nile, as shown above.

Credit: Worldometers

Since 1955 Egypt’s population has increased from 20 million to 117 million. Over half the population is under the age of 25, making it one of the most youthful countries in the world.

Here is a list of the top 21 countries by population. China, Russia, and Japan actually lost population last year! They’re marked in red. Check out the yearly change:

I’ve circled the countries with the fastest growing populations in green. The top four are all in Africa.

I wondered what the future might hold? The United Nations issued this interesting chart, projecting population growths to the end of the century, 75 years from now:

The United States goes from 3rd most populous to 6th. Egypt passes Mexico moving from 13th to 11th, while Mexico drops from 11th to 15th.

Cairo alone added 440,000 people just in the last year, making it the 6th most populous city in the world, just behind São Paulo, Brazil. That’s greater than the whole population of Toledo, Ohio, in one year! Just imagine!

Let’s zoom back in time to see how population centers have changed over time.

Here’s a list of some of the most populated cities over the course of history:

Year City Location Population

7,000 BCE: Jericho West Bank 1,000 - 2,000

4,000 BCE: Uruk Iraq 5,000

3,000 BCE: Uruk Iraq 45,000

2,000 BCE: Memphis Egypt 60,000

1500 BCE: Thebes Egypt 75,000

1000 BCE: Xian China 100,000

Memphis Egypt 100,000

Babylon Iraq 100,000

500 BCE Babylon Iraq 150,000

200 BCE Alexandria Egypt 300,000

1 CE Rome Italy 1,000,000

400 CE Rome Italy 400,000

1000 CE Kaifeng China 1,000,000

Cordoba Spain 350,000

Baghdad Iraq 1,200,000

1300 Hangzhou China 1,500,000

Cairo Egypt 500,000

1700 Beijing China 650,000

Ayutthaya Thailand 1,000,000

Constantinople Turkey 700,000

1900 London England 6,480,000

Cairo Egypt 570,000

2024 Tokyo Japan 37,000,000

Cairo. Egypt. 22,000,000. {See above for complete list}

It looks like our species homo sapiens is doing quite well!

When you drive through the countryside of the Midwest it seems like we are losing population. Many of the little towns have seen better days. But zooming out the population growth is undeniable. And it’s all in the cities. North America’s population continues to grow, though at a much lower rate than that of Africa and Egypt in particular.

Credit Creative Commons:

Above: World population from 1950 to 2050 (100 year). Warning! This chart is logarythmic! Even on a logarithmic chart the growth rate is impressive.

I tried to find a graph showing the growth from the time of the Old Kingdom to the present, but it’s “off the charts.” I need some aspiring mathematician to help me on that one.

It will be quite a cultural shock for us to see so many people in one place.

What is your takeaway on these population numbers?

In addition to looking at population growth, we also need to try to get some perspective on how OLD Egyptian history is.

I started to write this morning about the Old Kingdom of Egypt, which lasted for 325 years, from 2675 BCE until 2130 BCE, a period of 545 years. This is the age when the pyramids were built.

Socrates and his pupil Alexander the Great lived in 332 BCE, exactly half-way between our time and the beginning of the Old Kingdom.

Julius Caesar lived 100 years closer to our time than to the END of the Old Kingdom!

The Old Kingdom spanned 545 years, longer than the time since Columbus first visited North America!

I tried to graph the history out on a time line but the scale is just too great. Reminds me of my trial lawyer days trying to make up graphs and charts for juries!

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We’re at the Lake for a few days. I spent all day yesterday doing a final leaf clean up while listening to my Egyptian History Podcast. Just in time as it turns out!

The snow continues to fall. Though we’re not supposed to get too much here, I’m glad I got all the leaves raked.

Thanks for traveling along!

Earlier posts about Egypt include the following:

November 26: Here Comes the Sun: Preparing for the trip - books and podcasts

December 3:

December 13: