PRESENT STATE OP ETHNOLOGY IN RELATION TO THE 

 FORM OF THE HUMAN SKULL. 



By Professor Anders Retzius, of the Carolinska Institute, Stokliolm. 



[Translated for the Smithsonian Institution from the Archives des Sciences Physiques et Nalu* 

 relies, Geneva, 1860, by C. A. Alexaddkr.] 



Twelve years ago I presented to the assembly of Scandinavian nat- 

 uralists some considerations on the form of the human skull among 

 different nations, considerations based upon facts which I had com- 

 municated two" years before. The doctrine sketched at that time was 

 entirely new, and had been submitted to no competent proof; its 

 destiny seemed uncertain, and many gaps remained to be filled up. 

 But since that epoch, the classification proposed for skulls of different 

 form has been more solidly established, and may be affirmed to be 

 complete, as I here propose briefly to show. 



A. — Forms of the Skull in Europe. 



At the time referred to, I had indicated that the majority of the 

 nations of western Europe are dolichocephahe, while the brachy- 

 cephalse predominate in eastern Europe.* This assertion has since 

 been confirmed from different quarters. 



°A communication from Professor J. Aitken Meigs, of Philadelphia, furnishes the trans- 

 lator of this paper with material for a note which cannot be otherwise than acceptable, 

 whether to the general reader as an explanation of scientific terms, or to those who propose 

 to euter on such inquiries, especially to the observant traveller in little-explored countries, 

 as an indication from a highly competent source of the measurements proper to be taken 

 for determining the ethnographic character of the human head. 



"The late Professor Anders Retzius, of Stockholm, divided the races of men into two 

 great groups according to the form of the bead, or rather according to the ratio existing 

 between the length and breadth of the skull. Nations in whom the head is developed 

 chiefly in the occipitofrontal or longitudinal diameter he called dolichocephdce, or long-heads, 

 (from co\i\oi, long, and Kt<pa\rj, head;) races whose skulls are developed in the bi-parietal 

 diameter particularly, or in the direction of the breadth, to such au extent as to exhibit a 

 more or less rounded or square form, he termed brachycepkalce, or short-heads, (from 0pa\";, 

 short, and KscpaXq ) Both the dolichocephalse and brachycephalse he again subdivided into 

 the orthognathy, or straight-jawed, (from Option, upright, and yvaQo s , jaw,) andtheprognathrc, 

 or prominent-jawed, (from npe, forwards, and yvadog )" In other words, nations with a per- 

 pendicular profile are orthognathic, as the Germans, Anglo-Saxons, &c ; those with a retir- 

 ing profile are prognathic, as the negro. 



"Retzius's division of the human family," continues Professor Meigs, "is liable to the 

 objection that it forces into one or other of these two classes races whose skulls in point 

 of conformation occupy an intermediate position. The measurements by which differences 

 in size and form of crania are determined are variously taken by different cranio- 

 graphers. Some systematic writers make many of these measurements, others apply but a 

 few. The oceipito-frontal or longitudinal diameter is ordinarily measured from the glabella 

 to the most prominent point of the occipital bone, 'lhe glabella is the prominence on the 

 frontal bone, between the orbits and just above the root of the nose. The most projecting 

 point of the occiput correspon 's in the majority of cases with the external occipital pro- 

 tuberance or boss. This diameter gives the length of the head. The bi-pafietal diameter 

 coincides with the breadth of the head, and is generally measured from one parietal protu- 

 berance to the other. The depth or vertical height of the skull is measured from the 



