1931 census of Palestine
Encyclopedia
The 1931 census of Palestine was the second census
carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine. It was carried out on 18 November 1931 under the direction of Major E. Mills. The first census
had been conducted in 1922. Following the 1931 census, no further census was conducted in Palestine by the British administration.
The total population reported was 1,035,821 (1,033,314 excluding the numbers of H.M. Forces) – an increase of 36.8% since 1922, of which the Jewish population increased by 108.4%.
The population was divided by religion as follows: 759,717 Muslims, 174,610 Jews, 91,398 Christians, 9,148 Druzes, 350 Bahais, 182 Samaritans, and 421 "no religion". A special problem was posed by the nomad
ic Bedouin
of the south, who were reluctant to cooperate. Estimates of each tribe were made by officers of the district administration according to local observation. The total of 759,717 Muslims included 66,553 persons enumerated by this method. The number of foreign British forces stationed in Palestine in 1931 totalled 2,500.
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine. It was carried out on 18 November 1931 under the direction of Major E. Mills. The first census
1922 census of Palestine
The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922.The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality...
had been conducted in 1922. Following the 1931 census, no further census was conducted in Palestine by the British administration.
The total population reported was 1,035,821 (1,033,314 excluding the numbers of H.M. Forces) – an increase of 36.8% since 1922, of which the Jewish population increased by 108.4%.
The population was divided by religion as follows: 759,717 Muslims, 174,610 Jews, 91,398 Christians, 9,148 Druzes, 350 Bahais, 182 Samaritans, and 421 "no religion". A special problem was posed by the nomad
Nomad
Nomadic people , commonly known as itinerants in modern-day contexts, are communities of people who move from one place to another, rather than settling permanently in one location. There are an estimated 30-40 million nomads in the world. Many cultures have traditionally been nomadic, but...
ic Bedouin
Bedouin
The Bedouin are a part of a predominantly desert-dwelling Arab ethnic group traditionally divided into tribes or clans, known in Arabic as ..-Etymology:...
of the south, who were reluctant to cooperate. Estimates of each tribe were made by officers of the district administration according to local observation. The total of 759,717 Muslims included 66,553 persons enumerated by this method. The number of foreign British forces stationed in Palestine in 1931 totalled 2,500.
Publications
Three volumes of data derived from the census were published by the Government of Palestine. They were edited by the Superintendent of Census and Assistant Chief Secretary, E. Mills.- Census of Palestine 1931. Population of Villages, Towns and Administrative Areas. Jerusalem, 1932 (120 pages).
- Census of Palestine 1931, Volume I. Palestine Part I, Report. Alexandria, 1933 (349 pages).
- Census of Palestine 1931, Volume II. Palestine, Part II, Tables. Alexandria, 1933 (595 pages).
Further reading
- Miscellaneous short extracts from the census reports at Emory University: http://www.ismi.emory.edu/Articles/Census_1931.pdf.
- J. McCarthy, The Population of Palestine, Columbia University Press (1988). This contains many pages of tables extracted from the census reports.