DEMOGRAPH

Four thousand years of world population — a data-driven remake of Sparks's 1931 Histomap.

Stream width

Absolute

Share of the world, or absolute population.

Time axis

Linear

Compressed

Compressed shrinks the deep past and expands recent centuries.

Stateless / unmapped

Shown

Hidden

Hidden renormalizes widths to governed population — Sparks's implicit view.

Palette

Layers

Event annotations Navigation minimap World map

Export

SVG

PNG

SVG is vector — best for poster printing.

Reading it

Hue = civilization

Unrecorded local states

Stateless / unmapped

Click a stream → focus its region
Shift-click → focus its civilization
Esc or click again → back
Drag the right-edge minimap to scroll

HISTOMAP 2

Four thousand years of world history — population living under each polity, 2000 BCE–2015 CE.

the world — hover the chart