Inhabitants.
The population enumerated at the census taken in April 1907 was 11,189,978. In these figures nomad Arabs or Bedouins, estimated to number 97,381, are not included. The total population was thus returned at 11,287,359, or some 16% more than in 1897 when the inhabitants numbered 9,734,405. The figures for 1897 compared with 6,813,919 in 1882, an increase of 43.5% in fifteen years. Thus, during the first twenty-five years of the British occupation of the country the population increased by nearly 4,500,000. In 1800 the French estimated the population at no more than 2,460,000; the census of 1846 gave the figures at 4,476,440. From that year to 1882 the average annual increase was 1.25%. If the desert regions be excluded, the population of Egypt is extremely dense, being about 939 per sq. m. This figure may be compared with that of Belgium, the most densely populated country in Europe, 589 per sq. m., and with that of Bengal, 586 per sq. m. In parts of Menufia, a Delta province, the density rises to 1352 per sq. m., and in the Kena province of Upper Egypt to 1308.
The population is generally divisible into—
1. The fellahin or peasantry and the native townsmen.
2. The Bedouins or nomad Arabs of the desert.
3. The Nuba, Nubians or Berberin, inhabitants of the Nile valley between Assuan and Dongola.
4. Foreigners.
The first of these divisions includes both the Moslem and Coptic inhabitants. The Bedouins, or the Arabs of the desert, are of two different classes: first, Arabic-speaking tribes who range the deserts as far south as 26° N.; secondly, the tribes inhabiting the desert from Kosseir to Suakin, namely the Hadendoa, Bisharin and the Ababda tribes. This group speak a language of their own, and are probably descendants of the Blemmyes, who occupied these parts in ancient times (see [Arabs]; [Bedouins]; [Hadendoa]; [Bishārīn]; &c.). The Nubas are of mixed negro and Arab blood. They are mainly agriculturists, though some are keen traders (see [Nubia]).
Foreigners number over 150,000 and form 1½% of the total population. They are chiefly Greeks—of whom the majority live in Alexandria—Italians, British and French. Syrians and Levantines are numerous, and there is a colony of Persians. The Turkish element is not numerically strong—a few thousands only—but holds a high social position.
Of the total population, about 20% is urban. In addition to the 97,000 pure nomads, there are half a million Bedouins described as “semi-sedentaries,” i.e. tent-dwelling Arabs, usually encamped in those parts of the desert adjoining the cultivated land. The rural classes are mainly engaged in agriculture, which occupies over 62% of the adults. The professional and trading classes form about 10% of the whole population, but 50% of the foreigners are engaged in trade. Of the total population the males exceed the females by some 46,000.