128 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. JIG 



time stressing the importance of preserving "this corner-stone [i.e., 

 the Tajik type] for our ethnographical constructions." 



Some authors (e.g., Ivanovich) has attempted to identify the Tajiks 

 with the remains of the Nestorian Christians (v^ho lived in Central 

 Asia during the sixth century) or with Slavs, remarking that the 

 Tajiks are blond, have large features, and amiable, frank dispositions. 



Other investigators (e.g., Vambery) did not regard the Tajiks as 

 pure representatives of the "Aryans" or of their Iranian branch. 

 Vambery states that it is impossible to consider the Tajiks to be a 

 primary type of the Iranian race ; that while their Iranian type is 



Table 4. — Grouping according to cephalic index 

 Group Range No. Shugni No. Rushani No. Wakhi 



Dolichocephal x-75.9 3 1.29 3 ^.14 1 1.92 



Mesocephal 76.0-80.9 34 14.71 8 19.04 4 7.69 



Brachycephal 81.0-85.9 94 40.69 12 25.57 18 34.61 



Hyperbracliycephal . . 86.0-x 100 43.31 19 45.25 29 55.78 



Total 231 loo.o 42 loo.o 52 loo.o 



readily apparent to the eyes, their facial characters manifest some 

 alien Turanian traits (broad forehead, wide zygomatic arches, thick 

 nose, and large mouth). Only the inhabitants of Mountainous 

 Badakhshan (Faizabadians) have a more truly pronounced Iranian 

 type. 



Danilov does not consider the Tajiks as Iranians. He bases his 

 conclusions partly on the studies of Korsh, who derived the name of 

 Tajiks from the Pehlevi word tasi, meaning "Arab," and partly on 

 the brachycephaly of the Tajiks, which Danilov, whose work lay only 

 among the dolichocephalic population of Persia, did not consider an 

 Iranian character. 



Other investigators considered the Tajiks to be the resultant mix- 

 ture of several races. Thus, Virskii considers the Galchas to be a 

 mixed Aryo-Turkish type, preserving certain tribal characters. The 

 Tajiks, according to Virskii, represent a mixture of the Aryan and 

 Turkish races with the Persian and the Jewish types. 



Grebenkin, who described the Tajiks of the valleys, states that they 

 do not belong to any established type, but unite in their composition 

 the characters of all the tribes inhabiting the region. "The Tajiks 

 of this region are an amalgam of all the surrounding tribes. . . . This 

 mixture reflects in it the type of Uzbek, Tatar, Hebrew, Gipsy, even 

 Slavic, Arabic, Persian and Indian." 



