A long while a history professor said to the class I was in that before the Mongol invasions, Kiev was a greater city then medieval era Rome, Paris or London ? How accurate would is this?

by Garrus37
y_sengaku

In short: While it is not easy to compare the estimated population (probably based on different criteria, data, and period) and Kyiv/ Kiev was clearly not the greatest city in Europe, OP's teacher's statement seems largely not to entirely off the point, possibly except for Paris, as long as we focused on Kyiv/ Kiev's zenith period.

+++

The tricky point to approach OP's question is the relatively early zenith of medieval Kyiv/ Kiev's demography, based on settlement research. Mezentsev calculates it as 35,000 to 40,000 in the middle of the 11th century, also citing previous estimations by Tolochko (8,000 households - 48,000 people?) and Gupalo (24,000 inhabitants in its core area (Podil)) and Kuza (37,000 to 45,000 inhabitants) (Menentsev 1989: 160, note 62). Historiography also supposes either its relative stagnation or a slight decline in demography in course of the late 12th and early 13th century until the sack by the Mongols.

This estimated demographic figure of Kyiv/ Kiev in 1050 is actually quite high compared with those cities in contemporary Latin West since they had largely not enjoyed the fruit of high medieval economic as well as demographic growth yet.

Wickham comments on the demographic estimation on medieval Rome as following:

"It [Rome] was, around 1050, still the largest city in demographic terms in Latin Europe, with perhaps around thirty thousands inhabitants, although Milan, I myself guess, may have overtaken it around 1100 (Wickham 2015: 136)."

The latest book on medieval Rome also roughly confirms this figure proposed by Wickham, 20,000-30,000 in the late 10th century (Dey 2021: 138). Anyway, these figures suggest that Rome and Milan had had at least little less population than Kiyv/ Kiev in the 11th century, but they probably caught up (or even outstripped) Kyiv/ Kiev in course of the 12th century.

In addition to Milan, other "dark horses", although clearly very well-known towns, that escaped the mention by OP's teacher were Cordoba under the Caliphate and Constantinople. If we compare Kyiv/ Kiev with other contemporary "European" cities, they should also be taken into consideration, I suppose.

I have difficulty in finding any reliable source on medieval demography of medieval Paris prior to 1200. The article of Oxford Reference estimates a little less than 200,000 Parisian inhabitants in late 13th century (Heller 2016), but this estimated figure was after Kyiv/ Kiev's sack as well as the population growth due both to the general trend of Latin West in High Middle Ages and to the political development of Paris as de facto capital of Capetian France.

As for medieval London, the estimated figure in 1086 varies according to historians, from 10,000 to definitely much less than 20,000, probably less than 18,000 (Cf. Griffiths 2003: 97f.).

+++

On the other hand, this latest data set of European urban population, 700–2000 (https://www.doi.org/10.17026/dans-xzy-u62q) offers us roughly similar picture, though I'm not so sure about their basis of numerical figures.

If we believe its estimation, the estimated figures of individual cities in 1000 are:

  • Kyiv/ Kiev (10th): 20,000

~ (for Comparison)

  • Constantinople (1st): 235,000
  • Cordoba (2th): 100,000
  • Sevilla (3rd): 72,000
  • Palermo (4th): 60,000
  • Thessaloniki (5th): 40,000
  • Toledo (6th): 37,000
  • Merida (7th): 30,000
  • Rome (7th): 30,000
  • Milan (9th): 22,000
  • Chernihiv/ Cernigov (10th): 20,000
  • Jaen (10th): 20,000

~

  • Paris: 15,000
  • London: 11,000

+++

In sum, except for two metropolis, Cordoba and Constantinople, medieval Kyiv/ Kiev could definitely belong to one of the most populous cities in Europe in its demographical zenith in the 11th century: at least about the same size of Rome and Milan in Italy, and definitely much larger than London.

References:

  • Bringh, Eltjo. "The Population of European Cities from 700 to 2000". In: Research Data Journal for the Humanities and Social Sciences (Sep. 2021) (Last Access: Mar. 08, 2022). https://brill.com/view/journals/rdj/6/1/article-p1_3.xml

  • Dey, Hendrik. The Making of Medieval Rome: A New Profile of the City, 400-1420, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2021.

  • Griffiths, David. "Exchange, Trade, and Urbanization." In: From the Viking to the Normans, ed. Wendy Davies, pp. 73-104. Oxford: OUP, 2003. Short Oxford History of the British Isles 3.

  • Heller, Sarah-Grace. "Paris" Oxford Bibliographies (Last Modified: Apr. 28, 2016). DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195396584-0200

  • Mezentsev, Volodymyr I. “The Territorial and Demographic Development of Medieval Kiev and Other Major Cities of Rus’: A Comparative Analysis Based on Recent Archaeological Research.” The Russian Review 48, no. 2 (1989): 145–70. https://doi.org/10.2307/130324.

  • Wickham, Chris. Sleepwalking into the New World: The Emergence of Italian City Communes in the Twelfth Century. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2015.

  • (Edited): Adds [Dey 2021] that I forgot to include in the reference.

  • (Edited 2): Corrects misspellings to "Kyiv".