Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-18T07:34:25.285Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

VI - Population

from PART II - c. 1500–1750

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

By
Irfan Habib
Edited by
Tapan Raychaudhuri  and
Irfan Habib
Get access

Summary

So far as is known, no census of persons was ever conducted in any part of the Mughal empire. The size of the population of Mughal India can, therefore, be estimated only on the basis of other data, the richest repository of which is the A'īn-i Akbarī, the unique work compiled by Akbar's minister, Abū-l Fazl, in 1595–6.

The A'īn-i Akbarī gives us details of the ārāzī or area measured for revenue purposes, down to each Pargana, the smallest administrative subdivision of the time. Moreland attempted to use these statistics, first, to work out the total area under cultivation at the end of the sixteenth century, and then to estimate, on this basis, the total population of Akbar's empire. He assumed that the ārāzī represented the entire gross cropped area, and concluded that in western Uttar Pradesh, cultivation around 1600 was about three-quarters of what it was around 1900, and further that the proportion declined as one went eastwards, to be just one-fifth in eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. He thought that cultivated land per capita was the same in 1600 as in 1900; and, on this basis, estimated the population of the plains from ‘Multan to Monghyr’ to be between 30 and 40 millions. This, as his core figure, together with his estimate of 30 million for the Deccan and southern India (arrived at on the basis of other considerations), led him to estimate the total population of India in 1600 at about 100 million.

Keywords

agricultural productivityIndustrial Revolutioneconomic impacturban populationMughal Indiarural population
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Economic History of India , pp. 161 - 171
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1982

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alam Khan, Iqtidar ‘The Middle Classes in the Mughal Empire’, Presidential Address, Sec. II, in Proceedings of the Indian History Congress., Aligarh Session, 1975; the same pub. in Social Scientist, Trivandrum, August, 1976.Google Scholar
Alam, M. ‘The Zarnindars and Mughal power in the Deccan, 1685–1712’ The Indian Economic and Social History Review, New Delhi., XI (I), March 1974.Google Scholar
Bernier, Francois, Travels in the Mogul Empire, 1656–68, trans, from French by Brock, Irving, revised and annotated by Constable, A., London 1891 (photo-offset edn, Delhi, 1968); this version, revised and annotated by Smith, V. A., London, 1914, 1916, etc. (same pagination).
Careri, Gemelli (1695), A Voyage Round the World, English trans. of ,original Italian printed in Awnsham and Churchill, John, A Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV, London, 1704.
Davis, K. The Population of India and Pakistan, Princeton, 1951.
Deane, P. and Cole, W. A., British Economic Growth, Cambridge, 1962.
Desai, A. V. ‘Population and Standards of Living in Akbar's Time’, The Indian Economic and Social History Review, New Delhi., IX (1), March 1972.Google Scholar
Early Travels in India 1583–1619 (Accounts of Fitch, Ralph, Mildenhall, John, Hawkins, William, Finch, William, Withington, Nicholas, Coryat, Thomas, and Terry, Edward), ed. Foster, W., London, 1921 (photo-offset edn, Delhi, 1968).
Fazl, Abu'l (1595), A'īn-i Akbarī, ed. Blochmann, H., 2 vols., Bib. Ind., Calcutta, 1867–77. Translated in 3 vols., Vol. I by Blochmann, H., revised by Phillott, D. C.; and Vols. II and III by Jarrett, H. S., revised by Sarkar, J., Calcutta, 1927–39 (Vol. I), 1949 (Vol. II), 1948 (Vol. III).
Fryer, John A New Account of East India and Persia being Nine Years’ Travels 1672–81, ed. Crooke, W., 3 vols. Hakluyt Society, 1909, 1912 and 1915.
Godinho, , Surat in 1663 as described by Manoel Godinho, trans. Moraes, G. M., Journal of the Bombay Branch of the (Royal) Asiatic Society, Bombay, 27, Pt. (ii) (1952).Google Scholar
Habib, I. Agrarian System of Mughal India, Bombay, 1963.
Habib, I. ‘Note on Population, 1800–1872’, Seminar on the Colonization of the Indian Economy, Aligarh, 1971 (Cyclostyled).Google Scholar
Habib, I. ‘Potentialities of Capitalistic Development in the Economy of Mughal India’, JEH, 29.1 (March 1969); the same with revisions pub. in Enquiry, N.S. III (3) (O.S. No. 15), Winter 1971, Delhi.Google Scholar
Hamīd Lāhorī, ‘Abdu'l (d. 1654–5), Pādshāhnāma or Bādshāhnāma, ed. Ahmad, Kabīru'ddīn and Rahīm, ‘Abdu'r, 2 vols. Bib. Ind., Calcutta, 1867–72.
Hamilton, Alexander A New Account of the East Indies, being the Observations and Remarks of Captain A. Hamilton (1688–1723). (I) Printed in Pinkerton, John, General Collection of the best and most interesting Voyages and travels in all parts of the World, VIII, London, 1811 ; (2) ed. Foster, W., 2. vols. London, 1930.Google Scholar
Letters Received by the East India Company from its Servants in the East (1602–17), 6 vols., ed. Danvers, F.C. (Vol. I) and Foster, W. (Vols. II–VI), London, 1896–1902.
Mahalanobis, P. C. andBhattacharya, D., ‘Growth of Population of India and Pakistan’ (cyclostyled paper), Pre-census Population Studies Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta, 1969.
Manrique, Fray Sebastian, Travels of Fray Sebastian Manrique (1628–41), trans. Luard, C. E. and Hosten, H., 2 vols., Hakluyt Society, 1927.
Monserrate, Tr. Antonio (1590–91), Mongolicae Legationis Commentarius, ed. Hosten, , Calcutta, 1914; trans. Hoyland, J. S. and Banerjee, S. N., ‘Commentary’ on his Journey to the Court of Akbar, Cuttack, 1922.Google Scholar
Moosvi, S. ‘Production, Consumption and Population in Akbar's time’, The Indian Economic and Social History Review, New Delhi., x (2), 1973.Google Scholar
Moosvi, S. ‘Magnitude of Land Revenues, Demand and the Income of the Mughal Ruling Class under Akbar’, Medieval India – a Miscellany, IV, Aligarh, 1977.Google Scholar
Moreland, W. H. India at the Death of Akbar, London, 1920.
Moreland, W. H. ‘The Agricultural Statistics of Akbar's Empire’, Journal of the United Provinces Historical Society, Lucknow., II (I), 1922.Google Scholar
Saksena, Rai Chaturman (1759–60), Chahār Gulshan, Library, M. A. (Aligarh) MS. Habibganj 32/157, partly trans. Sarkar, J. in India of Aurangzeb, Calcutta, 1901.Google Scholar
U’ddīn Ahmad, Nizām (1592–3), Tabaqāt-i Akbarī, ed. De, B. and Muhammad, Hidayat Husain, 3 vols. Calcutta, 1913–41.
Xavier's, J. letter, tr. Hosten, , Journal of {Royal) Asiatic Society of Bengal, Calcutta, N.S., XXIII (1927).

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×