Studies in Paleopathology 



39i 



the specimen later, suggested that it might 

 have been a iracture with callus and 

 necrosis. 



8. Fistula are evident in the lower jaw 

 of an ancient and 



primitive whale 

 from the Eocene of 

 Egypt, and an en- 

 largement of the 

 mandible of a 

 three-toed horse 

 from the Miocene 

 of North America 

 indicates the pres- 

 ence of a fistula, 

 possibly due to 

 actinomycosis, in 

 its early stages. 

 Dental fistula? are 

 occasionally seen 

 among the known 

 remains of fossil 

 man, often result- 

 ing in the loss of 

 teeth. 



9. Rickets is in- 

 dicated, according 

 to Abel, among the 

 apes which are 

 found mummified 

 in the old Egyptian 

 graves. 



10. Necroses, 

 due possibly to a 

 variety of causes, 

 and attributed by 

 certain French 

 writers to tuber- 

 culosis, are fairly 

 common among 

 fossil vertebrates. 

 A marked necrosis 



T 



Fig. 18. The arm bones of a mosasaur from the Cretaceou 

 of Kansas, showing lesions resembling osteoperiostitis. The 

 la ge bone is the humerus, the other probably a radius. 

 The rough surface of the bone indicates its pathology. 

 Normal well-preserved specimens of these bones are quite 

 smooth. The lesions have an arthritic nature also, though 

 they are not confined to the articular surfaces, x J/^. 



The specimens are the property of the University of 

 Kansas Museum of Natural History. 



Museum in Washington. A mosasaur bone 

 from the Cretaceous of Kansas and certain 

 crocodile limb bones from the Jurassic of 

 England show lesions of a necrotic nature. 



The assignment of 

 any of the lesions 

 to a definite cause 

 is manifestly im- 

 possible, and while 

 tuberculosis has 

 been suggested as 

 a possible cause, 

 the diagnosis is so 

 uncertain as to be 

 nearly worthless. 

 In the crocodile 

 skeleton, above 

 referred to, there 

 is abundant evi- 

 dence that the in- 

 fection, the focus 

 of which was in 

 the pelvis, was 

 carried by metas- 

 tasis to the bones 

 of the palate which 

 were also involved, 

 as well as other 

 parts of the body. 

 11. Hyperosto- 

 sis or pachyosto- 

 sis, which is similar 

 to the enlargement 

 of the bones in 

 Gigantism, is indi- 

 cated as thickened 

 and enlarged por- 

 tions of the skel- 

 eton. This condi- 

 tion has been de- 

 tected in certain 

 fossil Paleozoic 



of the ilium of a 



large dinosaur, accompanied by expansion 

 and thickening of the bone, is evident 

 in the mounted skeleton of Campto- 

 saurus on exhibition at the National 



fishes and Mesozoic 

 reptiles, some of them of great geological 

 antiquity. A genus of fossil whales, known 

 as Pachycantbus, has the neural, vertebral 

 spines very greatly enlarged and swollen. 



