DIXON— A NEW THEORY OF POLYNESIAN ORIGINS. 265 



plained as due to the absorption of a certain amount of Melanesian 

 blood by the Polynesian ancestors, in the course of their migration 

 through or along the margin of Melanesia. The geographic dis- 

 tribution of crania of this type, as shown by the present study, 

 seems to show this view to be practically untenable, and to lead to 

 the conclusion that a stratum of relatively pure Austro-Melanesian 

 type must have preceded the " Polynesians " in Polynesia. For 

 like the Negrito type, this also is marginal in its occurrence, and 

 while the Negrito type survives most strongly in Hawaii in the 

 north, this appears in greatest strength in Easter Is. on the eastern 

 margin of the area. It makes its influence felt in the northern 

 islands of the Hawaiian group, in the Marquesas and Central Poly- 

 nesia, and plays a notable part in New Zealand. Here, there is 

 interesting evidence to show that one of its most common deriva- 

 tives, very numerous throughout Melanesia, has played a double 

 role, entering into the composition of the Maori people not only 

 at an early date, but reappearing again much later as a relatively 

 recent factor in the make-up of that extremely complex people. 



The third and historically clearly the latest type which has con- 

 tributed to the making of the Polynesian people, and the one whose 

 influence has for long been preponderant over a large part of the 

 area, is one which is Brachycephalic, Hypsicephalic and Leptorrhine. 

 This type is one which forms a very important factor in the rather 

 complex Malayan and Eastern Asiatic populations, but for which 

 I have not as yet found a wholly satisfactory name. In Polynesia, 

 this type seems strongest in Sa:moa and Tonga in the west, and of 

 great importance in the southern islands of the Hawaiian group, 

 while it plays a considerable part in Central Polynesia and New 

 Zealand. Curiously, little trace of it occurs in Easter Island to 

 the east. 



Although these three fundamental types and their derivatives or 

 blends comprise the great majority of the Polynesian population, the 

 indications of the presence of a small minority of a fourth funda- 

 mental type, must not be overlooked ; for although it itself survives 

 only in very small proportions, some of its derivatives are not unim- 

 portant in Hawaii and New Zealand. This is a Dolichocephalic, 



