[quote=Schradinger]
Where are you getting that figure? I haven't been able to find any population estimates for Cyrodiil. Am I overlooking something?
[/quote]

TES does not give us much on population aside from the size of every province in the form of square miles, but all you need to learn the rought estimate of a population in a pre-industral age is the general size of the region and then take into account other factors, like farmable land, economic status, and general climate. Cyrodill has the benefit of being large and temperate.

But here's the [url=http://www222.pair.com/sjohn/blueroom/demog.htm]skeleton[/url] for people to do their own sums, beast races and mer races are much harder to pin point due to their very different birth rates to that of men, but not impossible, Black Marsh is fairly unique in that it is almost unlivable except for Argonians. As a side note, Black Marsh came out with the most powerful force if all things are taken into consideration at the start of this, for one they suffered least from the Oblivion crisis, lead a ver successful campaign in Morrowind, and had all that time to rebuild well everyone else was bleeding themselves dry in the Great War. 

Out of all the provinces/kingdoms, They would certainly be among the top 3 most powerful realms atm. At least in the start of this, now they've called in more with the hist....The Akaviri really chose the worst place to start their conquest. :P