Evolution, Genetics, and Anthropology ' 



By A. E. MoURANT 



The Lister Institute 

 London 



THE BEGINNINGS OF ANTHROPOLOGY 



The ability to distinguish members of other species from those of 

 one's own is, throughout most of the animal kingdom, a vital necessity 

 for purposes of reproduction. The power of distinguishing members 

 of other races or communities within the species is much less wide- 

 spread, and seems to be most fully developed, apart from man, in that 

 other great social and warlike group, the Hymenoptera. Somewhat 

 ironically, we find that among the bees the basis of distinction, and 

 of violent adverse discrimination, is not an inherited or in any way 

 permanent set of characteristics, but the ephemeral flower perfume 

 shared at any one time by the occupants of a given hive. 



Among the primates we know little of any recognition or discrim- 

 ination below the species level, but we can be certain that recognition 

 of alien species as such has always existed, and that from the beginning 

 human beings were aware of differences between themselves and the 

 other primates. They did not, however, necessarily become aware 

 immediately of the differences arising between human communities 

 as one race diverged from another, for, as with most other animal 

 species, spatial or ecological separation was undoubtedly necessary 

 before physical differentiation could become established. Certainly, 

 however, from the beginning of history as recorded in writing and 

 pictures, we find descriptions and representations of those features, 

 both of body and dress, which characterize different races and nations, 

 at first usually in the form of records of conquered peoples, upon 

 monuments of victory set up by their conquerors. 



For thousands of years, however, the criteria used for describing, 

 and distinguishing between, human populations lacked precision, and 

 little attempt was made to distinguish between inherited and acquired 



1 The Huxley Memorial Lecture, delivered In the rooms of the Royal Society, Burlington 

 House, on Friday, November 24, 1961. Reprinted by permission from the Journal of the 

 Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, vol. 91, pt. 2, July- 

 December 1961. 



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