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Thoughts on the Historical Development of the Population of China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Earl H. Pritchard
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In accordance with tradition, it now becomes my duty to perform a time honored rite—to inflict on you the Presidential Address. I will try to do this as painlessly and as quickly as my own inadequacies will permit, but before settling down to the excruciating details I would like, in all seriousness, to throw out a suggestion to this Association, although other learned societies are welcome to it because I have no intention of seeking a patent; namely, that die Presidential Address be given either by the vice-president who becomes president at this meeting or by the rearing president at the next annual meeting. This procedure will permit the president to devote his undivided attention to the business of the Association while he is president and give the writer an opportunity to prepare his talk when he is not completely up to his ears in other Association activities. It should produce better Presidential Addresses, and should prolong the lives of ex-presidents by at least five years.

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Research Article
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 23 , Issue 1 , November 1963 , pp. 3 - 20
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1963

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References

1 Amiot, J. J. Marie, “Population de l'empire chinois,” in Mémoires concernant … des Chinois (Paris, 1776–1814) VI, 277 ff, 374–380.Google Scholar

2 Biot, Edouard, “Mémoire sur la population de la Chine et ses variations, depuis l'an 2400 avant J. C jusqu'au XIII siècle de notre ère,” Journal Asiatique, sér. 3, I (1836), 369–394, 448–474 Google Scholar. An additional memoir in, II (1836), 74–78, covers the Ming period, and further information is provided in V (1838), 305–331.

3 Zakharov, T. (Sacharoff), “Historische Übersicht der Bevölkerungs-Verhältnisse Chinas,” in Arbeiten der Kaiserlichen Russischen Gesandtschaft zu Peking über China II, (Berlin, 1858), 129–95Google Scholar. English translation from the German by Rev. Lobscheid, W., The Numerical Relation of the Population of Chin, during the 4000 Years of Its Historical Existence; or, The Rise and Fall of the Chinese Population (Hon Kong: A Shortrede & Co., 1862; 2nd ed., 1864)Google Scholar. The original Russian version was published in 1852 in volume one of the Travaux des Membres de la Mission Russe.

4 Parker, Edward H., “A Note on Some Statistics Regarding China,” Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, LXII (1899), 150–156 Google Scholar. Figures are from the Tung-hua lu and cover the period 1651 to 1860.

5 Rockhill, William Woodville “Inquiry into the Population of China,” Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collection (Quarterly Issue), XLVII (Dec. 10, 1904), 303–321.Google Scholar

6 Willcox, Walter F., “A Westerner's Effort to Estimate the Population of China, and Its Increase sine 1650,” Journal of the American Statistical Association, XXV (09, 1930), 255–268 CrossRefGoogle Scholar (This article als appeared in Bulletin de l'Institut International de Statistique, XXV [1931], 156–170)Google Scholar; “The Population of China and Its Modern Increase,” in Willcox's Studies in American Demography (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1940), 511–540.Google Scholar

7 Ch'en, Ch'ang-heng, “Some Phases of China's Population Problem,” Bulletin de l'Institut International de Statistique, XXV (1931), 18–54 Google Scholar; “Changes in the Growth of China's Population in the last 182 Years,” Chinese Economic Journal, 1 (01 1927), 59–69 Google Scholar; also Ch'en, Chungshen S., “The Chinese Census of Population since 1712,” Bulletin de l'Institut International de Statistique, XXV (1931), 122–155.Google Scholar

8 Liu, Nanming, Contribution à l'étude de la population chinoise (Geneva: Imprimerie et éditions Union, 1935).Google Scholar

9 Fitzgerald, C. P., “Historical Evidence for the Growth of the Chinese Population,” The Sociological Review, XXVIII (1936), 133–148, 267–273 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This article, although mentioning original sources, does not refer to a single modern study.

10 See Chao, Ch'eng-hsin, “Recent Population Changes in China,” Yenching Journal of Social Studies, (06, 1938), 1–48, especially pp. 34–36 Google Scholar; the introductory parts of Ta Ch'en's Population in Modern China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1946)Google Scholar, a special monograph of the American Journal of Sociology, pt. 2, 07, 1946 Google Scholar; Jaffe, A. J., “A Review of the Censuses and Demographic Statistics of China,” Population Studies, I (12, 1947), 308–337.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 Durand, John D., “The Population Statistics of China, A.D. 2–1953,” Population Studies, XIII (03, 1960), 209–256.Google Scholar

12 For a discussion of this work see Teng, S. Y. and Biggerstafi, Knight, An Annotated Bibliography of Selected Chinese Reference Works (Rev. ed., Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1950), pp. 150–151 Google Scholar. Similar works include Tu Yu's Tung tien (801), Li Tao's Hsü tzu-chih t'ung-chien ch'ang-pien (1174) and Wang Ch'i's Hsü wen-hsien tung-K'ao (1586), among others. The geographical sections (Ti-li chih) of the dynastic histories for the Han, Chin, Wei, Liu Sung, Sui, Tang, Sung, Chin (Kin), Yüan, and Ming dynasties are basic sources, as are the economic summaries at the end of each year of the Ming and Ch'ing Shih-lu (Veritable Records) and the Tung-hua lu of the Manchu period. Other basic sources are the Collected Institutes of the Sung (Sung hui-yao hao), Ming (Ta-Ming hui-tien), and Ch'ing periods (Ta-Ch'ing hui-tien), and the great geographies, such as, Yüeh Shih's (930–1007), Tai-p'ing huan yü-chi, Wang Ts'un's Yüan-feng chiu-yü chih (1080), and the Ta-Ming i-t'ung-chih and Ta-ch'ing i-t'ung chih. These works are described in either Teng and Biggerstaff or Yu-shan Han's Elements of Chinese Historiography (Hollywood: W. M. Hawley, 1955).Google Scholar

13 See the “Critical Review of Population Estimates on China” by Shih-ta, Wang, “Chin-tai Chung-kuo jen-k'ou ti ku-chi,” She-hui k'ou-hsüeh chi-k'an (Quarterly Review of Social Sciences), I (Peiping, 1930)Google Scholar, No. 3–4, continued in vol. II, nos. 1–2, 1931, and the works by Katō Shigeru, Yüan Chen and others noted in notes 24 to 29 below.

14 Bielenstein, Hans, “The Census of China During the Period 2–742 A.D.,” Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 19 (1947), 125–173 Google Scholar, especially 153–156.

15 Ho, Ping-ti, Studies on the Population of China, 1368–1953 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1959). pp. 24–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 Consider for example Tu Yu's reasons for believing that the T'ang households in 755 were around 13–14 million, instead of the 8.9 million given in the official figures ( T'ang tien, ch. 7, p. 16a Google Scholar as cited in Balazs [see note 21 below], footnote 23); also the significant figures on households, individuals, and adult males (ting) for 1080 given by Pi Chung-yen (Wen-hsien t'ung-k'ao, section on population [Hu-k'ou k'o], ch. 11), and the light thrown on many problems by the local gazetteers used by Ho Ping-ti.

17 Ho actually must have done a great deal of this for the Ming and Ch'ing periods, although most of the detailed figures were not tabulated and published in his study. Bielenstein has also collected a great deal of material from gazetteers and other sources from the mid-T'ang into the Ch'ing period and promises the results of this in a companion to his earlier study in the not too distant future.

18 My original intention was to publish these prefectural figures as an appendix to this article, but as they were assembled it became evident that they were too bulky for this purpose. Separate publication will also allow more space for analysis, discussion, interpretation, and annotation of these detailed figures.

19 van der Sprenkel, Otto Berkelbach, “Population Statistics of Ming China,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (London), XV (1953), 289–326.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20 Taeuber, Irene B. and Wang, Nai-chi, “Population Reports in the Ch'ing Dynasty,” JAS, XIX (08, 1960), 403–417.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

21 Balazs, Étienne (Stefan), “Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte der T'ang-Zeit (618–906),” Mitteilungen des Seminars für Orientalische Sprachen (Berlin), XXXIV (1931), 1–92 Google Scholar, especially 10–25, and “Le traité économique du Souei-chou” T'oung pao, XLII (1953), 113–329 Google Scholar, especially 307–320; see also Edwin G. Pulleyblank's estimate of the population of Sui (609) and T'ang (742–755) by provinces in his Background of the Rebellion of An Lu-shttn (London: Oxford University Press, 1955), pp. 172–177 Google Scholar, and decrees of 721 and 724 regarding migrants, pp. 178–182.

22 Eichhorn, Werner, “Gesamtbevölkerungszïffern des Sung-Reiches,” Orient Extremas, IV (1957), 52–69.Google Scholar

23 Prefectural figures for the Sung period for 980, 1078–80, 1102 and provincial figures for 1162 are actually given in Wright, Hope's Geographical Names in Sung China: An Alphabetical List (Paris: École pratique des Hautes Études, 1956)Google Scholar, but the figures have to be located by looking up the prefecture (fu or chou) or province (lu). The figures for 980 are from the T'ai-p'ing huan yü-chi, those for 1078–80 from the yüan-feng chiu-yü chih and those for 1102 and 1162 are from the geographic section of the Sung shih.

24 Katō Shigeru, “Sōdai jinko tōkei ni tsuite” (On the Population Census of the Sung Period), in his collected Shina keizai-shi kōshō (Studies on Chinese Economic History) (Tokyo, 1952–1953) II, 317–337, 371–400 Google Scholar. The first study appeared in 1930 in volume 14 of the Tōyō-shi kōza and the second was written a year later in reply to criticisms of Miyazaki Ichisada, Hino Kaisaburō, Aoyama Sadao, and Sogabe Shizuo. Since the second article summarizes the arguments of his opponents, the two articles pretty well sum up Japanese thinking on the Sung population question in the early 1930's.

25 Yüan Chen, “Sung-tai jen-k'ou” (Sung Dynasty Population), Li-shih yen-chiu (Historical Research), No. 3 (Peking, 03, 1957), 9–46 Google Scholar. Mr. Yuan takes the view that the Sung household was small (average 2.8 persons), and hence that the population of Sung China in 1110 was only 46.7 million; yet he seems unhesitatingly to accept that the part of north China which Chin took over had a population of 44.5 million in 1187 and that the size of the household had miraculously jumped to 6.43 persons. Aside from the useful tables, much of the article is devoted to enumerating the burdens of the Sung population, and he concludes that the startling growth of the population of north China under Chin was due to its reduction of the economic burdens of the people. One is not impressed with the scientific objectivity of Communist reasoning in this article.

26 Sun Kuo-tung, “Sung-tai jen-k'ou hu-to k'ou-shao wen-t'i” (A Discussion of the Large Number of Households and Small Number of Persons per Household during the Sung), Hsin-ya hsüeh-pao (New Asia Journal), no. 2 (Hong Kong, 1960), 1–14.Google Scholar

27 Kuo-ting, Wan “Han-i-ch'ien jen-k'ou chi t'u-ti li-yung chih i-pan” (Population and Land Utilization in China in Han and Pre-Han), Nanking Journal, 1931.Google Scholar

28 Kan, Lao, “Population and Geography in the Two Han Dynasties,” in E-tu Zen Sun and John De Francis, Chinese Social History (Washington: American Council of Learned Societies, 1956), pp. 83–101 Google Scholar; this is an abbreviated translation of his article in Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology, V, pt. 2 (1935), 179–214.Google Scholar

29 Ch'üan Han-sheng and Wang Yeh-chien, “Ch'ing-tai ti jen-k'ou pien-tung” (Population Changes in China during the Ch'ing Dynasty), Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology, XXXII (Taipei, 1961), 139–180.Google Scholar

30 Studies of new areas settled and internal movements of population are of basic importance, especially the long period of movement into the south and the southwest; consider Wiens, Herold J., China's March Toward the Tropics (Hamden, Conn: Shoe String Press, 1954)Google Scholar; Miyakawa, Hisayuki “The Confucianization of South China,” in Arthur F. Wright, The Confucian Persuasion (Stanford University Press, 1960), pp. 21–46 Google Scholar; Ho, Franklin L., “Population Movement to the Northeastern Frontier of China,” Chinese Social and Political Science Review, XV (10, 1931)Google Scholar, no. 3; Lin, T. C., “Manchuria in the Ming Empire,” Nankai Social and Economic Quarterly, VIII (04, 1935), 1–43.Google Scholar

31 New crops and agricultural techniques are particularly important and probably were fundamental factors in population expansion during the Sung and Ch'ing periods. See Ho, Ping-ti, “Early-Ripening Rice in Chinese History,” Economic History Review, IX (12, 1956), 200–218 Google Scholar, and his “The Introduction of American Food Plants into China,” American Anthropologist, LVII (04, 1955), 191–201 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ch''an, Han-sheng, “Production and Distribution of Rice in Southern Sung,” in Sun and De Francis, Chinese Social History, pp. 222–233.Google Scholar

32 Developments of this sort may be fundamental to population expansion or contraction. See Hartwell, Robert, “A Revolution in the Iron and Coal Industry During the Northern Sung, 960–1126 A.D.,” JAS, XXI (02, 1962), 153–162 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lo, Jung-pang, “The Emergence of China as a Sea Power during the Late Sung and Early Yüan periods,” FEQ, XIV (08, 1955), 489–503.Google Scholar

33 Useful beginnings on the study of floods and droughts have been made by Yao, Shan-yu, Floods and Droughts in Chinese History: Their Distribution and Correlation 206 B.C.-A.D. 1911 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Dissertation, 1941. 457 Google Scholar pages, available in microfilm; a summary appeared in HJAS, VI [Feb., 1942], 273–312), and SirHosie, Alexander, “Droughts in China A.D. 620 to 1643,” JNChBRAS, XII (1878), 51–89 Google Scholar, but more detailed information as to location, area affected and intensity are necessary to determine their effects on population trends. The effect of prolonged floods created by the change in the course of the Yellow River during the Wang Mang period is well illustrated in Hans Bielenstein, The Restoration of the Han Dynasty (BMFEA, 26, 31) (Stockholm, 1954–59). More detailed studies of famines are necessary, as are careful studies of pestilences; see Lien-teh, Wu, “The Original Home of the Plague,” Japanese Medical World, 01 15, 1924 Google Scholar, and Wong, K. C. and Lien-teh, Wu, History of Chinese Medicine (2nd ed., Shanghai, 1936), pp. 509 ff.Google Scholar

34 On wars and internal strife, see Lee, J. S. (Li Ssu-kuang), “The Periodic Recurrence of Internecine Wars in China,” China Journal of Science and Arts, XIV (03, 04, 1931), 111–115, 159–163 Google Scholar, and his study in Chinese on “Cycle of War and Peace” in Studies Presented to Tsai Yüan-pei noted in China Institute Bulletin, IV, (04, 1940), 7.Google Scholar

35 Durand, , op. cit., pp. 218–219 Google Scholar. A study of some 12,456 rural families in 22 localities during the early 1930's gave an average rate of increase of 10.9 per 1000 ( Chao, Chi-ming, “A Study of the Chinese Population,” Milbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, XI (10, 1933), 325–341 CrossRefGoogle Scholar and XII (Jan., April, July, 1934). 85–96, 171–183, 270–282, especially 275. Taeuber, , op. cit., pp. 409–412 Google Scholar, calculated the actual growth rate upon the basis of Ch'ing figures at 1.0 per cent from 1757–62, 0.83 per cent from 1780–1812, and 0.40 from 1840–50. Ho, Population, pp. 64, 270, 277 Google Scholar, gives the following growth rates on the basis of Chinese population figures: 1779–94, 0.87 per cent; 1822–50, 0.51 per cent; 1865–1953, 0.45 (Note the declining growth rate in both Ho's and Taeuber's figures). These compare with an Eastern European rate of 0.771 per cent from 1800 to 1850.

36 Consider the case of the An Lu-shan rebellion of 755–762, where the recorded population figures drop from 52.9 million in 755 to 16.9 million in 764; see Fitzgerald, C. P., “The Consequences of the Rebellion of An Lu-shan Upon the Population of the T'ang Dynasty,” Philobiblon (Nanking), 2 (09, 1947), 4–11 Google Scholar, and Pulleyblank, Edwin G., “Neo-Confucianism and Neo-Legalism in T'ang Intellectual Life, 755–805,” in A. F. Wright, The Confucian Persuasion, pp. 77–114 Google Scholar; also Pulleyblank's book on An Lu-shan cited in note 21.

37 Fitzgerald, C. P., “A New Estimate of the Chinese Population Under the Tang Dynasty in 618 A.D.,” China Journal of Science and Arts, XVI (01, 02, 1932), 5–14, 62–74 Google Scholar, and in Fitzgerald's Son of Heaven (Cambridge University Press, 1933), pp. 5, 209–215.Google Scholar

38 A good beginning on maps of this type for A.D. 2, 140, 464, 609, and 742 has already been made by Bielenstein, Census, p. 163 Google Scholar ff. If the dots are put on maps showing modern provincial boundaries, they will be even more valuable.

39 See the works by Liu, Ta Chen, Chao, and Chiao already noted and the studies they have cited; see also Aird, John S., The Size, Composition, and Growth of the Population of Mainland China (U. S. Dept. of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, International Population Reports, Series P-90, No. 15, 1961).Google Scholar

40 Ho, Population, pp. 8, 12, 41–42, 57–59, 62, 68, 96 Google Scholar. Chiao, in the study cited in note 35, found the ratio in the modern rural population to be 109 males to 100 females (pp. 95–96), while the 1953 census figure was 107.5 males to each 100 females (Ho, p. 96); see also Tao, H. M., “Population,” in The Chinese Year Book, 1935–36 (Shanghai: Commercial Press, 1935), pp. 113–131, especially 122–125.Google Scholar

41 Ho, Population, pp. 58–59 Google Scholar. Children up to 17 years of age constituted 41.1 per cent of the population according to the 1953 census (Ho, p. 97). Chiao in his sample of rural population found that people from 0–14 years of age made up 35 per cent of the population, those from 15–49, 51 per cent, and those 50 or above 14 per cent. These figures corresponded exactly with the averages for eleven European countries in 1900 (p. 90).

42 Liu, , pp. 42–45 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. In light of the other figures just cited, this seems a not unreasonable figure.

43 Balazs, , Beiträge, pp. 14–16 Google Scholar, footnote 23.

44 Durand, , pp. 226–228 Google Scholar and Eichhorn, , pp. 61–63 Google Scholar, and footnote 69; see also Katō, Yüan, and Sun cited in notes 24–26. Katō also summarizes the arguments of Miyazaki, Hino, Aoyama, and Sogabe; see also Kracke, Edward A., Civil Service in Early Sung China, 960–1067 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press 1953), p. 15 Google Scholar, footnote, and Hao, Fang, Sung shih (Taipei, 1954), II, pp. 120–126.Google Scholar

45 Robert Hartwell of the University of Chicago. In connection with his studies of Sung industry, he has done a great deal of work on population and may publish a study on the subject.

46 The household size of Chin was about 6.5, but the number of households remained roughly the same as when the Northern Sung dynasty controlled the area. This, I believe, is one of the strongest arguments for accepting the Sung household figures as the best guide to the population and disregarding the total population figures and the mouth-household ratio derived from them; see Durand, , p. 228 Google Scholar and Yüan, , pp. 25–28.Google Scholar

47 Bielenstein, , Census, pp. 160–161 Google Scholar; Pulleyblank, , An Lu-shan, pp. 172–177.Google Scholar

48 Bielenstein, , Census, pp. 145–148, 153–155 Google Scholar; Yang, Licn-sheng, “Notes on the Economic History of the Chin Dynasty,” HJAS, IX (06, 1946), 112–115.Google Scholar

49 Bielenstein, , Census, pp. 148–155, 161 Google Scholar; Balazs, , Beiträge, p. 10–25 Google Scholar; Durand, , pp. 222–225.Google Scholar

50 Yüan, , pp. 9–10, 29 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Eichhorn, , pp. 60–63 Google Scholar; Durand, , pp. 226–228 Google Scholar and Katō, , pp. 317–337 Google Scholar. Wittfogel, Karl A. and Chia-sheng, Feng, History of Chinese Society: Liao (907–1125) (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1949) pp. 52–59.Google Scholar

51 Durand, , p. 228 Google Scholar; Yüan, , 25–28, 42–45.Google Scholar

52 Durand, , p. 229 Google Scholar; Franke, Herbert, Geld und Wirtschaft in China unter der Mongolen-Herrschaft (Leipzig: Otto Harrassowitz, 1959), pp. 127–131.Google Scholar

53 For Ming figures see Van der Sprenkel, , pp. 293–297, 300–301 Google Scholar; Durand, , pp. 230–234 Google Scholar and, of course. Ho, Population, Chap, 1, especially p. 9, 22–23.Google Scholar

54 Ho, Population, pp. 277–278 Google Scholar; Durand, , pp. 234–249.Google Scholar

55 As a supplement to and extension of note 30, I want to mention the extraordinarily valuable articles by Chang, Sen-dou, “Some Aspects of the Urban Geography of the Chinese Hsien Capital,” Annals of the Association of American Geographers, LI (03, 1961) 23–45 CrossRefGoogle Scholar and “The Historical Trends of Chinese Urbanization,” AAAG, LIII (06, 1963), 109–143 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. These articles derive from a dissertation at the University of Washington dealing widi the history and spread of hsien capitals, and the maps and odier information in the articles and dissertation on the spread of these capitals is of great value. Consider also a valuable but unpublished article on “The Development of the Lower Yangtze Area between Han and Sui,” by Andrew March. These studies were called to my attention by Rhoads Murphey.