THE FOREHEAD^ 



By Ale§ HrdliCka 

 Curator, Division of Physical Anthropclofiit. T'nited States National Museum 



One of the chief features of man in esthetics, in the popular mind 

 and popular literature, in art, and in the mistaken old doctrines of the 

 " phrenologists " and " physiognomists ", the forehead has received 

 unexplainably little attention in science, save as to an occasional 

 descriptive characterization. 



In anthropometry, outside of my own work, the only measure- 

 ments taken on the forehead, and they but occasionally, were those 

 of the minimum frontal diameter and those relating to frontal bulg- 

 ing or slope. The sloping forehead, regarded generally as a sign 

 of inferiority, received especial attention, though mostly only de- 

 scriptively. The most important dimension of the forehead, its 

 height, was almost totally neglected. The only data on its measure- 

 ment are those of the artists and are embodied in a few of the artists' 

 "canons." 



The oldest of these canons or artists' standards in which the height 

 of the forehead is dealt with is that of Jean Cousin and dates from 

 the latter half of the sixteenth century.- In this the height of the 

 forehead, between the eyebrows and the hair line, is given as equal 

 to the length of the nose, which equaled one thirty-second of the 

 stature. This canon, modified somewhat by Blanc, became the last- 

 ing standard of French artists.^ In this eventual form it stipulated 

 that the forehead, from hair line to the root of the nose, was equal 

 to one nose length, which in turn equaled one-thirtieth, or 3.33 per- 

 cent, of the stature. 



The reasons why workers in anthropology failed to measure the 

 height of the forehead was the uncertainty of the landmarks. 

 Whether one should choose the line of the eyebrows or the root of 

 the nose for the lower limit, the point was more or less indefinite, 

 and the same appeared to be true of the upper limit, which was con- 

 siderably affected by the variation in hair insertion, and in whites 

 by the early loss of hair in that region in many male individuals. 



1 Reprinted by permission from I'rocoedings American I'iiilo.sophicjil Society, vol. 72, 

 no. 5, 19:'.3. 



" Livre de Pourctralture, Paris, 1571. 



• Topinard, I*., Elements d'Anthropologle g6n., Paris, 1S85. 



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