Professor John Sorenson believes that the population of a capital city, like Zarahemla, around 124 BC would have been about 25,000 people. While that number is not very remarkable today, what would it have been like to have a city of that size in the ancient world?
At the end of King Benjamin’s speech, what did the people do? They entered into a covenant and then recorded the names of those who did so (Mosiah 6:1). They apparently did not write down all the names of everyone in the land, just the ones entering into the covenant. A full census could have been taken another time. But since a new king was being enthroned, he needed to know whom he could count on and over whom he had direct responsibility and loyalty. Keeping records of such covenants was an important but difficult sacred practice.