Cycles and stability. Italian population before the demographic transition (225 B.C.-A.D. 1900)

The purpose of the present article is simply to summarize these recent changes (§ 1); to present a new long-term series and highlight the continuity of some original characters of Italian pre-modern demography (§ 2); to estimate the carrying capacity of Italian traditional agriculture and verify the compatibility of our demographic estimates with the Italian economy and environment (§ 3). We will then propose a model to explain the Italian demographic trend (§ 4) and the interplay of the variables involved (§ 5). We will see that the perspective of fluctuations around a long-term stability fits the known facts far better than the view of a long-term growth. This revision of the Italian demographic history cannot but suggest a different outline of Italy’s long-term past economic history on the whole.