Geography of Scotland Stirling. The 2001 census identified Glasgow as being the largest city in Scotland, with a total population of 629,501, while the Scottish capital, Edinburgh had a population of 448,624, in the same year. Between 1991 and 2001, the populations of Edinburgh and Stirling grew by 2.9% and 6.5% respectively. Inverness experienced population growth of over 10% during the same period. At the same time, Glasgow, Dundee and Aberdeen all witnessed population decline. Aside from the cities, the greatest intra-census population growth was experienced in the local authorities of West Lothian, East Lothian, Aberdeenshire and Perth and Kinross. The Western Isles
Demography of Scotland Fife indicate that arable land spread at the expense of forest from about 2000 BC until the period of the first century AD Roman advance into lowland Scotland, suggesting an expanding settled population. Thereafter, there was re-growth of birch, oak and hazel for a period of five centuries, suggesting that the Roman invasions had a negative impact on the native population. There are almost no written sources from which to re-construct the demography of early medieval Scotland. Estimates have been made of a population of 10,000 inhabitants in Dál Riata and 80-100,000 for Pictland, which was probably the largest region.