Historical population estimates for Egypt: a critical review

"This article attempts to piece together historical population estimates for Egypt and to assess their credibility, starting from Pharaonic times and continuing through the Greek and Roman eras and the Middle Ages.... While many doubts are raised concerning several of the estimates, the article suggests that population size in Egypt responded to societal conditions and that the demographic situation was at its worst during the Middle Ages. It improved only after the role of the Mamluks and the Ottomans had been terminated, early in the nineteenth century."