Demographics See also: Demographics of Turkey Historical populations Pre-Republic Year Pop. 100 36,000 361 300,000 500 400,000 7th c. 150–350,000 8th c. 125–500,000 9th c. 50–250,000 1000 150–300,000 1100 200,000 1200 150,000 1261 100,000 1350 80,000 1453 45,000 1500 200,000 1550 660,000 1700 700,000 1800 570,000 1850 785,000 1914 1,125,000 Post-Republic Year Pop. ±% 1924 500,000 — 1927 680,000 +36.0% 1935 741,000 +9.0% 1940 793,000 +7.0% 1945 860,000 +8.4% 1950 983,000 +14.3% 1955 1,258,000 +28.0% 1960 1,466,000 +16.5% 1965 1,742,000 +18.8% 1970 2,132,000 +22.4% 1975 2,547,000 +19.5% 1980 2,772,000 +8.8% 1985 5,475,000 +97.5% 1990 7,620,000 +39.2% 1995 9,260,000 +21.5% 2000 10,923,000 +18.0% 2005 12,061,000 +10.4% 2010 13,256,000 +9.9% Sources: Chandler 1987, Morris 2010, and Turan 2010 Pre-Republic figures estimated[e] Throughout most of its history, Istanbul has ranked among the largest cities in the world. By 500 AD, Constantinople had somewhere between 400,000 and 500,000 people, edging out its predecessor, Rome, for worlds largest city.[143] Constantinople jostled with other major historical cities, such as Baghdad and Changan, for the position of worlds most populous city until the 13th century. While it never returned to being the worlds largest, it remained Europes largest city from not long after the Fall of Constantinople until the start of the 19th century, when it was surpassed by London.[144] Today, it still forms one of the largest urban agglomerations in Europe, alongside Moscow.[d] The Turkish Statistical Institute estimates that the population of Istanbul was 14,160,467 on 31 December 2013, making it the largest city in Turkey, with 18,5 percent of the countrys population.[2] Because of its vast land area, Istanbul is among the five most populous cities proper in the world, even though its metropolitan area—roughly equivalent to the city proper—ranks below fifteenth.[4][146] The citys annual population growth of 3.45 percent ranks as the highest among the seventy-eight largest metropolises in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The high population growth mirrors an urbanization trend across the country, as the second- and third-fastest growing OECD metropolises are the Turkish cities of İzmir and Ankara.[13] Istanbul experienced especially rapid growth during the second half of the 20th century, with its population increasing tenfold between 1950 and 2000.[8] This growth in population comes, in part, from an expansion of city limits—particularly between 1980 and 1985, when the number of Istanbulites nearly doubled.[74] The remarkable growth was, and still is, largely fueled by migrants from eastern Turkey seeking employment and improved living conditions. The number of residents of Istanbul originating from seven northern and eastern provinces is greater than the populations of their entire respective provinces; notably, Sivas and Kastamonu each account for more than half a million residents of Istanbul.[9] Istanbuls foreign population, by comparison, is very small, amounting to just 42,228 residents in 2007.[147] Only 28 percent of the citys residents are originally from Istanbul.[148] Istanbuls population density of 2,523 people per square kilometer (6,530/mi2) far exceeds Turkeys 102 people per square kilometer (264/mi2).[149] The most densely populated areas tend to lie to the northwest, west, and southwest of the city center, on the European side; the most densely populated district on the Asian side is Üsküdar.[9] Religious and ethnic groups Main article: Religion in Istanbul See also: Kurds in Turkey, Greeks in Turkey, Armenians in Turkey and Jews in Turkey Yeni Cami (New Mosque) (1597–1665) on the Golden Horn, ordered by Sultana Safiye, wife of Sultan Murad III and Valide (Queen Mother) of Sultan Mehmed III. Istanbul has been a cosmopolitan city throughout much of its history, but it has become more homogenized since the end of the Ottoman Empire. Still, most of Turkeys religious and ethnic minorities remain concentrated in Istanbul. The vast majority of people across Turkey, and in Istanbul, consider themselves Muslim, and more specifically members of the Sunni branch of Islam. Most Sunnis follow the Hanafi school of Islamic thought, although approximately 10 percent of Sunnis follow the Shafii school. The largest non-Sunni Muslim sect, accounting for 4.5 million Turks, is the Alevis; a third of all Alevis in the country live in Istanbul.[148] Mystic movements, like Sufism, were officially banned after the establishment of the Turkish Republic, but they still boast numerous followers.[150] Inside the Patriarchal Basilica of St George at Fener. The Patriarch of Constantinople has been designated Ecumenical Patriarch since the 6th century, and has subsequently come to be widely regarded as the leader of the worlds 300 million Orthodox Christians.[151] Since 1601, the Patriarchate has been based in Istanbuls Church of St. George.[152] Into the 19th century, the Christians of Istanbul tended to be either Greek Orthodox or members of the Armenian Apostolic Church.[153] Because of a number of events during the 20th century—including the 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey, a 1942 wealth tax, and the 1955 Istanbul riots—the Greek population, originally centered in Fener and Samatya, has decreased substantially. At the start of the 21st century, Istanbuls Greek population numbered just 3,000 (down from 130,000 in 1923).[154][155] The Armenian population in Turkey also saw a decline, in part due to the Armenian Genocide, but it has been on the rebound because of recent immigration from Armenia; today, there are between 50,000 and 70,000 Armenians in Istanbul, down from 164,000 in 1913.[156] The largest ethnic minority in Istanbul is the Kurdish community, originating from eastern and southeastern Turkey. Although the Kurdish presence in the city dates back to the early Ottoman period,[157] the influx of Kurds into the city has accelerated since the beginning of the Kurdish–Turkish conflict with the Kurdistan Workers Party (i.e. since the late 1970s).[158] About two to three million residents of Istanbul are Kurdish, meaning there are more Kurds in Istanbul than in any other city in the world.[159][160][161][162][163] The neighborhood of Balat used to be home to a sizable Sephardi Jewish community, first formed during the period of the Spanish Inquisition.[164] Romaniotes and Ashkenazi Jews resided in Istanbul even before the Sephardim, but their proportion has since dwindled; today, just 1 percent of Istanbuls Jews are Ashkenazi.[165][166] In large part due to emigration to Israel, the Jewish population nationwide dropped from 100,000 in 1950 to just 18,000 in 2005, with the majority of them living in either Istanbul or İzmir.[167] Levantines, Latin Christians who settled in Galata during the Ottoman period, played a seminal role in shaping the culture and architecture of Istanbul during the 19th and early 20th centuries; their population has dwindled, but they still remain in the city in small numbers.[168]
Posted on: Mon, 08 Dec 2014 01:02:18 +0000
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