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attached to the bone, the external part of the superior curved lines, 
above the insertion of the neck muscles. Even if this muscle did 
not exist and the epicranial aponeurosis were at that place directly 
attached to the bone, this aponeurosis might serve as “punctum 
fixum” in the mimic contraction of the frontal muscle of Man. 
Accordingly the occipital muscle must certainly also serve another 
purpose; it can hardly be another than the constant application and 
rendering elastic of the cranial skin cover. 
That actually the skull and its contents need protection against 
the shocks caused by locomotion, is self evident, and appears clearly 
from the mechanical arrangement of its connection with the trunk. 
In most Mammals the head is attached to the end of a neck which 
deviates but little from the horizontal direction, to which it hangs 
as at an elastic rod sustained chiefly by the elastic ligamentum 
nuchae. The foramen magnum and the condyles lie on the back 
side of the skull and the axis of the spine coincides about with the 
axis of the brain. In the Anthropoid Apes the brain has become 
much larger; the foramen magnum has been displaced to the basis 
of the skull, the vertebral column is more oblique with regard to 
the brain axis, and with a weaker ligament much stronger neck 
muscles must sustain the skull and secure it and its contents by 
theit strain against concussions. In modern Man the brain has become 
very voluminous absolutely and in proportion to the face, the foramen 
magnum and the condyles are brought forwards to near the middle 
of the base of the skull, with which base the vertebral column 
forms a right angle, and the skull is balanced in unstable equili- 
brium on the spinal column. The latter has a double S-shaped 
curvature, with convex cervical- and lumbar curvature towards the 
front, and concave dorsal part, through which it possesses a high 
degree of elasticity and prevents shocks to the contents of the chest 
and the skull like the spring of a carriage. Notably the neck-curva- 
ture, which is characteristic only of the modern human species, 
makes that part of the spinal column an elastic stem of the head. 
The Neandertal Man did not possess this mechanism, as appears 
from the form of his cervical vertebrae. Accordingly the head hung 
forward, somewhat as in Anthropoid Apes. As, besides, the facial 
part was heavier than that of modern men, and as in this hanging 
over also the brain, which had greatly increased in weight in com- 
parison with the Anthropoid Apes, had to be upheld by muscular 
action, very great demands were imposed on the nuchal muscles 
(and ligament), also to secure the contents of the cranium against 
shocks, in spite of the supporting transverse axis of the skull, which 
