Accurate statistics concerning the population of the Ottoman Empire do not exist. The reliability of one of the figures is challenged by another. There is general agreement that the proportion of Armenians in the eastern part of the Empire had decreased since the area was annexed, but there is no concurrence on the degree of that decline. In the mid-nineteenth century, the statistician and traveller Ubicini and the Armenologist Dulaurier estimated the Armenian population of the Empire to be two and half million. 55 Ubicini asserted that the Armenians still maintained numerical superiority over the Moslems in the Erzurum eyelet (including Kars, Bayazid, and Childer) and in Kurdistan (including Van, Moush, Hekkiari, and Diyarbakir). 56 Statistics published in 1882 by the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople showed 2,660,000 Armenians in the Empire, 1,630,000 of whom lived in the six eastern provinces. 57 Thirty years later, the Patriarchate claimed that there were 2,100,000 Ottoman Armenians. This was half a million below the 1882 estimate. The decree might be explained by the 1894-1896 massacres, by continual exodus toward the Caucasus, Europe and America, and by the unreliability of the statistics. According to the 1912 figures, the Armenians were geographically distributed as follows: 58
| Western Armenia (Turkish Armenia) |
1,018,000 |
| Other parts of the six vilayets (peripheral areas) |
145,000 |
| Cilicia |
407,000 |
| European Turkey and the remainder of the Empire |
530,000 |
| Total |
2,100,000 |
For the three principal nationalities inhabiting Western Armenia, the Patriarchate gave the following statistics: 59
| |
Turks |
Kurds |
Armenians |
| Erzurum |
240,000 |
75,000 |
215,000 |
| Van |
47,000 |
72,000 |
185,000 |
| Bitlis |
40,000 |
77,000 |
180,000 |
| Kharpout |
102,000 |
95,000 |
168,000 |
| Diyarbakir |
45,000 |
55,000 |
105,000 |
| Sivas |
192,000 |
50,000 |
165,000 |
| Percentage of total population |
25.4% |
16.3% |
38.9% |
It was also claimed the in these provinces Christians constituted a plurality: 60
| Moslems |
Christians |
Other religions |
| Turks |
666,000 |
Armenians |
1,018,000 |
Kizilbashes |
140,000 |
| Kurds |
424,000 |
Nestorians |
123,000 |
Zazas |
77,000 |
| Other |
88,000 |
Greeks etc. |
42,000 |
Yezdis |
37,000 |
| Total |
1,178,000 |
Total |
1,183,000 |
Total |
245,000 |
| Percentage of total population |
45.1% |
|
45.2% |
|
9.6% |
|
