The Mahdist War

110,000

estimated total dead

Each dot below represents 1,000 human lives. Scroll to watch the scale unfold.

Military Dead

90,000 soldiers killed in combat, from wounds, or from disease. Each = 1,000 lives.

Mahdist Sudan (the Ansar) — 75,000 military dead

Britain & Egypt — 15,000 military dead

Civilian Dead

20,000 civilians killed — from violence, famine, disease, and displacement. Wars are not fought only by soldiers.

Civilian dead — 20,000

Deadliest Engagements

The Siege of Khartoum12,000

incl. 4,000 civilians

Battle of Omdurman12,000

Battle of El Obeid (Shaykan)11,000

Battle of the Atbara3,500

Battle of El Teb2,500

Battle of Tamai2,500

Battle of Toski1,500

Battle of Umm Diwaykarat1,500

For Perspective

How Mahdist War's dead compare to other conflicts and events.

Mahdist War — total dead110,000

Mahdist dead at Omdurman10,000

British & Egyptian dead at Omdurman48

Hicks's army destroyed at El Obeid10,000

Est. Sudanese dead, whole Mahdist era (war, famine)5,000,000

Milestones of Loss

48 dead

At Omdurman roughly 10,000 Mahdists were killed for about 48 of Kitchener's men — the starkest single illustration of the firepower gap of the age of the machine gun.

10,000 dead

Thousands of wounded Mahdists were killed on the Omdurman battlefield in the hours and days after the battle, a controversy that troubled observers including the young Churchill.

5,000,000 dead

Some estimates hold that the population of the Sudan fell catastrophically — by millions — over the whole Mahdist period from war, famine, and disease, though such figures are highly uncertain.

All figures are historical estimates and vary across sources. The true human cost of war is impossible to fully quantify — these numbers represent the best scholarly consensus. Each number was a person with a name, a family, and a life unlived.