﻿NO. I NATIVES OF KHARGA OASIS HRDLICKA 79 



The distribution of the nasal index of the Kharga men is some- 

 what peculiar. The apex of the curve illustrating the same precedes 

 unusually both the average and the median; following the apex 

 the curve is shouldered, and finally it shows a smaller secondary 

 grouping between 85.1 and 87.5. It seems as if there were a ten- 

 dency toward a double mode (at about 73.5 and 78) or even a triple 

 mode (+86). These features might be disregarded were it not 

 for the fact that Myers, on the Valley Egyptians, obtained " in all 

 the provinces which we chance to have examined frequency poly- 

 gons showing one peak at 72 or 78." x By mathematical considera- 

 tions Myers 2 is " forced to the conclusion that the coincident position 

 of the peaks, in the various provinces which we have been consider- 

 ing, is a matter of pure accident, and that it is in no sense a proof 

 of the presence of two' or more distinct ethnic types, variously dis- 

 tributed in the different provinces of the country." 2 But to the 

 present writer the accidental nature of the peculiarities of the dis- 

 tribution of the nasal index, both in the Valley and at the Oasis, is 

 not so clearly demonstrated. However the case may be, the follow- 

 ing facts are well established and should be borne in mind in this 

 connection : The Egyptian, in the Valley or the Oasis, is funda- 

 mentally distinct by descent and in physical characteristics from the 

 Nubian or Soudan negro ; but he is now everywhere more or less 

 mixed with the negro, and his nose, as well as hair, color, lips, and 

 doubtless other features, have suffered accordingly ; the nose of the 

 Egyptian, as known from the crania, mummies, and the present 

 more pure-blooded population, is mesorhinic, while that of the 

 negro is platyrhinic, and an admixture of the negro would tend 

 to augment the mesorhiny and cause the appearance, or make more 

 frequent the appearance, of platyrhiny — as well shown by Myers on 

 his " mixed " group and also in comparisons of the Copts and 

 Mahommedans ; 3 and the here enumerated effects can not but have 

 influenced the averages of the nasal measurements and index, as well 

 as their range and curves of distribution, in the present day Egyptian. 

 Whether they are responsible for the double apex of the nasal index 

 polygons in the Valley and for the peculiarities of that of the Oasis 

 men can be better determined when we have more knowledge con- 

 cerning the process of racial mixture and its effects, but the conditions 

 of the case are such that consequences of that nature may be regarded 

 as at least possible (fig. 12). 



1 L. c, Journ. Anthr. Inst., Vol. 36, 1906, p. 246. 



'Ibid., p. 255. 



3 Ibid., p. 263 et seq. 



