NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA. 40 



occiput.* In all the Brazilian crania, the occipital region is more or less 

 elongated and superiorly flattened, as in the Swedes. 



There are nine aboriginal American skulls in the collection at Fort Pitt, 

 Chatham. These are described by Dr. Williamson! in his catalogue. No. 67, 

 from Lake Huron, has a rounded occiput. No. 68, skull of a North American 

 Indian, has the occiput projecting. In No. 69 "the vertex and occiput are 

 well arched." In No. 70 the occiput is rounded. In No. 71 "the vertex and 

 occiput are well rounded." In No. 473, from Canada, the occiput is large 

 and well rounded, and the space for the downward development of the brain 

 in the occipital region is very great. No. 474, also from Canada, is a round 

 skull. No special statement is made concerning the form of the occiput, but 

 from the general description of the head, I consider it to be oval. In No. 475. 

 a Flathead, ' ' the occiput descends from the vertex abruptly, and almost per- 

 pendicularly to the foramen magnum." In No. 476, a Charib, from St. Vin- 

 cent, "the vertex gradually slopes backwards and downwards to the occiput, 

 which projects, and is narrow from above downwards ; the occiput is very flat, 

 and nearly the whole of the occipital bone rests upon a plane surface." 



The late Dr. Morton, as is well known, regarded flatness of the occiput 

 as a characteristic feature of the aboriginal American skull. In Crania 

 Americana (page 65), he expressly says that "flatness of the occipital 

 portion of the cranium will probably be found to characterize the 

 greater or less number of individuals in every existing tribe, from Terra del 

 Fuego to the Canadas. If these skulls be viewed behind, we observe the 

 occipital outline to be moderately curved outwards, wide at the occipital pro- 

 tuberances, and full from those points to the opening of the ear. From the 

 parietal protuberances there is a slightly curved slope to the vertex, pro- 

 ducing a conical, or rather a. wedge-shaped outline." He says, furthermore, 

 that even in the elongated heads of the Lenapes, the Iroquois, Cherokees, 

 Mandans, Rickarees, and Assinaboins, "the characteristic truncation of the 

 occiput is more or less obvious." In another publication^ when alluding to 

 the physical characteristics of the Indian tribes, he again speaks of ' ' the flat- 

 tened or vertical occiput" as a characteristic common to them all. In the 

 3d edition of his Catalogue of Skulls of Man and the Inferior Animals, Dr. M, 

 briefly describes a very remarkable head, found by Dr. Davis and Mr. 

 Squier, in a mound in the Scioto Valley, Ohio, and described and figured by 

 them in their "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley," plates 47 and 

 48. Dr. M. regarded this head as the "perfect type of the Indian conforma- 

 tion, to which the skulls of all the tribes, from Cape Horn to Canada, more 

 or less approximate. It possesses the national characteristics in perfection, 

 as seen in the elevated vertex, flattened occiput, &c. Similar forms, " he con- 

 tinues, "are common in the Peruvian tombs, and have the occiput as in this 

 instance, so flattened and vertical as to give the idea of artificial compression : 

 yet this is only an exaggeration of the natural form, caused by the pressure of 

 the cradle-board, in common use among the American nations." 



In his last contribution to craniography, Dr. Morton describes the typical 

 Indian skull to be of a decidedly rounded form, with the occipital portion 

 flattened in the upward direction. 



Dr. Morton's opinion concerning the typical form of the occiput in the 

 various tribes of American Indians, though very generally acquiesced in by 

 craniographers, has not been accepted by all without qualification. 



" L'inspection des cranes mexicains," writes Dr. Gosse, of Geneva, repre- 

 sentes dans les Crania Americana me semble prouver que chez ces derniers, 



* L'Homme Americain. Atlas, Plate i. fig, 1. 



t Op. cit. pp. 64-67, 83, 85. 



X Inquiry into the Distinctive Characteristics of the Aboriginal Race of America, p. 5. 



jS The Physical Tvpe of the American Indians. 



I860.] 28 



