Predictions from Time Series Analysis of the Oscillations in Parish Register Series

Parish registers provide invaluable data series for theoretical population biologists and historical demographers alike and previous studies with time-series analysis have shown how the population dynamics of these communities can be determined and modelled. However, many demographic parameters of the community have previously been determined only by the laborious technique of family reconstitution. It is suggested that some of these functions may be estimated by the application of conventional time-series analysis to the aggregative annual totals in the registers of baptisms, marriages and deaths: (i) age of mother at birth of median child; (ii) estimations of fertility function; (iii) mean age at marriage; (iv) estimations of mortality function; (v) factors governing the population boom; (vi) the patterns of population dynamics that might be found and the detection of steady-state conditions in communities in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. These theoretical predictions have been verified in a parish where the demographic parameters have been determined by family reconstitution and excellent correspondence has been found.