Epigraphy and demography: birth, marriage, family, and death
Walter Scheidel
Princeton/Stanford Working Papers in Classics, June (2007)
Abstract
In recent years, the adoption of key concepts and models of modern population studies has greatly advanced our understanding of the demography of the Greco-Roman world. Epigraphic evidence has made a vital contribution to this development: statistical analysis of tens of thousands of tombstone inscriptions has generated new insights into mortality regimes, marriage practices, and family structures in various parts of the ancient Mediterranean. In conjunction with papyrological material, these data permit us to identify regional differences and facilitate long-term comparisons with more recent historical populations. After a brief survey of the principal sources of demographic information about the classical world, this paper focuses on the use of inscriptions in the study of population size, mortality, fertility, nuptiality, sex ratios, family formation, and household organization.
Since the 1980s, the demographic study of the Greco-Roman world has experienced a revival that has been driven by the use of concepts, models, and comparative evidence derived from the population history of the more recent past.1 It was not the discovery of significant amounts of new data but new approaches to existing evidence that have made this progress possible. Demography critically relies on numbers: in the words of two prominent historical demographers, ‘demography without numbers is waffle’. This is necessarily true for all historical periods: qualitative impressions, derived from literary texts or individual inscriptions or papyri or skeletons or archaeological sites, cannot provide a reliable picture of general conditions and trends. And since demography is by definition concerned with the physiological and relational properties of large collectives, general conditions and trends are precisely what we need to know about.
Epigraphy and demography: birth, marriage, family, and death
Walter Scheidel
Princeton/Stanford Working Papers in Classics, June (2007)
Abstract
In recent years, the adoption of key concepts and models of modern population studies has greatly advanced our understanding of the demography of the Greco-Roman world. Epigraphic evidence has made a vital contribution to this development: statistical analysis of tens of thousands of tombstone inscriptions has generated new insights into mortality regimes, marriage practices, and family structures in various parts of the ancient Mediterranean. In conjunction with papyrological material, these data permit us to identify regional differences and facilitate long-term comparisons with more recent historical populations. After a brief survey of the principal sources of demographic information about the classical world, this paper focuses on the use of inscriptions in the study of population size, mortality, fertility, nuptiality, sex ratios, family formation, and household organization.
Since the 1980s, the demographic study of the Greco-Roman world has experienced a revival that has been driven by the use of concepts, models, and comparative evidence derived from the population history of the more recent past.1 It was not the discovery of significant amounts of new data but new approaches to existing evidence that have made this progress possible. Demography critically relies on numbers: in the words of two prominent historical demographers, ‘demography without numbers is waffle’. This is necessarily true for all historical periods: qualitative impressions, derived from literary texts or individual inscriptions or papyri or skeletons or archaeological sites, cannot provide a reliable picture of general conditions and trends. And since demography is by definition concerned with the physiological and relational properties of large collectives, general conditions and trends are precisely what we need to know about.
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