There's also the fact that the new Grand Duke would have been actively seeking to encourage immigration, since even with the Church-guaranteed neutrality he would have needed a bigger tax base. The similarity of Silkiahan and Desnairian accents suggests that the Empire either had a lot of less than thrilled subjects who were delighted to move north, or encouraged a lot of movement in the hopes that they would, in a generation or 2 'naturally' opt to petition the Church for reinclusion in their homeland. If the latter, I have the impression that they were due to be disappointed even before the late unpleasantness.
lyonheart wrote:Hi JeffEngel,
RFC's post responding to my exuberance almost 3 years ago had several surprises, particularly the low population numbers.
We now know there is also a Silk Town-Thesmar Canal, that was very probably there in 869, since building an 800-900 mile canal in 20 years with muscle power is going to take an awful lot of people, but the more important thing is it almost triples the territory within Silkiah in easy reach of a canal for farmers to get their products to market in 2-3 days.
Your description of the "Grand Duchy of Sexiah" sounds more like Ireland before the great potato famine, when the population quadrupled in 30-40 years within most women being grandmothers by their early 30's, etc.
However I suspect RFC's 'largely uninhabited' could mean a very low rate relative to the rest of Safehold's highly populated tropics, then again perhaps most of the land was largely empty, maybe only 3-5 people per square mile, while that within 80-100 miles of the canals had over 45; Martin van Creveld's rather low median of mid 17th century European population, especially low for western Europe since well irrigated warm Lombardy had 110 per mile^2 while Prussia with its poor soils and deep winters had only 35, for a range of population of 11-15 million to start with.
Given a population growth rate of 3-4% annually over 24-27 years from 869 for the 46 million [was that for 894 or 895, or 896?], that population could easily double [at 3% for 24 years] if not triple at 4% in 27, before getting into immigration rates; probably from Desnar and Dohlar as you have supposed, of something under 500,000 per year for the low end down to a tenth that at the high end.
So whenever RFC addresses this current conundrum, he'll have very reasonable median numbers to explain, not forgetting we still have so little of the puzzle yet.
I hope that helps moderate your concerns.
LJeffEngel wrote:It's not Silkiah's population density as such that has me curious there - it's the timing. Apart from Silk Town, it's gone from largely uninhabited, unorganized, unconsecrated territory in about twenty years to a place with 45 million people in it. That last includes Silk Town, but there's only so many people Silk Town is going to include. Even supposing it had a hinterland sufficient to give it all the agriculture it needed back before there was a Grand Duchy, we're still talking perhaps 2 million people back then, and probably less. 2 million to 45 in 20 years is not the result of resident human population growth - well, not unless Silkiahan women, menarche to menopause, are every one of them conducting some kind of obstetric marathon exercise and Silkiahan men are dedicating themselves to a lifestyle of sex, diaper-changing, and marrying off their 15 year old sons and daughters to carry on the tradition. Oh, and regularly having twins and triplets, and being all between 15 and 25 or so initially.
I think Silkiah would have gotten a certain remarked-upon reputation in that case. "The Rabbit Duchy" perhaps, or "the Grand Duchy of Sexiah".
One possibility is that Silkiah's western border maybe included some pre-existing small, independent earldoms that made a living selling produce to Dohlar. But that's not only pulling a possibility out of thin air, it's also leaving us a mystery why they didn't end up part of Dohlar (or Desnair, or Siddarmark) already.
If Silkiah, after the Treaty of Silk Town, did get to be a peaceful, prosperous place, with lots of land to claim, consecrate, and put to use, large and early families would be likely, and Pasqualites will keep infant mortality and complications of pregnancy and childbirth down to late 19th century rates on Safehold. So a baby boom could well be part of it. And we needn't suppose the whole Grand Duchy started off totally depopulated but for Silk Town and its agricultural breadbasket. But I still think that has to leave immigration as the largest source of that population growth. That does introduce questions about the sources and reasons for that immigration.
