THE HUMAN SPECIES 



523 



The great African or Negroid group. The Negroid peoples are dis- 

 tinguished chiefly by the following traits: hair form woolly or frizzly; 

 skin color dark brown to black; eyes dark brown to black; nose opening in 

 skull broad. Other traits include: nose with bridge and root usually low, 

 profile concave or straight, rarely convex, tip thick and usually elevated, 

 "wings" thick and flaring; lips thick, the upper convex, membranous 

 lining much everted; lower face often protrusive; head form medium to 

 long, brow ridges small and forehead rounded; hair almost absent on 

 body and scant on face, generally short on head; arms and legs with long 

 distal segments; pelvis relatively narrow; female breast form usually 

 conical and buttocks usually less 

 projecting than in "Whites." Ex- 

 cluding the Melanesians, Boyd de- 

 fines the African group in terms of 

 blood genes as being tremendously 

 high in Rh°, moderate in rh, rela- 

 tively high in A 2 and the rare inter- 

 mediate A (A i_ 2 , etc.) and Rh 

 genes, rather high in B, and prob- 

 ably with normal M and N 

 frequencies. 



The African Negro race includes most 

 of the native African populations south 

 of the Sahara. In all these people there is 

 a high incidence of the traits just listed 

 but great variation in other respects. In 

 different groups stature may be short to 

 tall, body build medium to robust, legs short to long. The many tribes occupy 

 the tropical forests of West Africa and the Congo Basin, and the more open park- 

 land and savanna regions of the Sudan, East Africa, and South Africa, except 

 where the Nilotes occur. The large New World populations of African Negroes are 

 concentrated in the eastern United States, around the Caribbean, and in Brazil; 

 they are everywhere mixed with "Whites" and American Indians in varying 

 combinations. 



The Nilotic Negroes are a distinctive subrace found about the headwaters of 

 the Nile and in the lake region of Africa. Straighter-faced, narrower-nosed, and 

 longer-headed than other Negroes, they are excessively tall and slender, and 

 include the tallest people in the world. There are whole tribes in which the men 

 average 6 feet in height, with 6 feet 8 inches as common a variation as 5 feet 4 

 inches. There may be some Mediterranean in the Nilotes, but this cannot account 

 for their tallness. 



The Melanesian Negro race, the second major division of the Negroids, is found 

 far away from Africa in the great island group extending from New Guinea 

 eastward through the Solomons and New Hebrides to Fiji. This island chain has 



Fig. 31.9. A Negro youth from the Congo 

 Basin in Africa. (Courtesy American Mu- 

 seum of Natural History.) 



