CIRJE-J-115. Ishihara, Shunji, "The Formation of the Modern Population Statistics in Sweden --- Parish Registers and the Population Tables", July 2004.

The Population Tables of 1749 are one of the earliest censuses in the world. Parish registers were to form the basis of these population statistics. Moreover the organization of the Swedish state church was taken advantage in order to take statistics. For example, the basic information was collected separately in each parish by the parson who knew parishioners very well. So the Population Tables could have the following merits.

1. All of the Swedish people must belong to the Swedish state church. So the Population Tables could cover the most of all the population in Sweden.

2. The parson visited every family in the parish and checked the information about the family members in parish registers. So the information of the Population Tables was precise as a whole.

3. The Population Tables could take up many sorts of information about the Swedish population. Because parish registers had dealt with various sorts of information (date of birth, marriage, burial, migration and household membership etc). Moreover the parson could collect the other sorts of information such as cause of death.