1864. ] Turner on the Fossil Skull Controversy. 253 
ences in the conformation of corresponding parts of the bodies of men 
of different races, but of individuals of the same race; variations 
which, though they may be great enough to constitute large and im- 
portant individual differences, are still not sufficient to warrant our 
assuming the absence of those characters which are especially and 
distinctively human. I refer not only to those variations in the form 
of the features, the colour of the skin, and the nature of the hair, 
which are discernible on an external examination of the body, but to 
those deeper or internal differences affecting the origin and distribution 
of the blood-vessels, the extent of attachment of the muscles, the 
non-formation in some cases of muscles usually present, and in other 
cases the development of new muscles. Similarly, the bones them- 
selves may exhibit great variations in the size of their ridges and 
processes ; and in some individuals processes may even occur which do 
not generally enter into the formation of the human skeleton.* All 
these afford illustrations of such a great amount of variability as to 
cause the careful human anatomist to hesitate, if an unusual structure 
or arrangement in a part evidently human were shown him, before he 
ventured to pronounce such structure or arrangement to be an indi- 
cation that the being in whom it occurred was either a distinct species 
of man, or a form transitional between man and the lower animals. 
The Neanderthal skull unquestionably possesses a very remarkable 
shape, one which sufficiently distinguishes it from other known crania. 
But we must inquire whether its anatomical characters are altogether 
exceptional. Is it not possible, in carefully examining an extensive 
collection of skulls, such as are presented to the anatomist in a large 
museum or dissecting-room, to find crania closely allied to it in some 
of those features which are regarded as most distinctive? I have, 
during the past year, directed much attention to this matter, and have 
examined numerous crania, both of savage and European nations. 
The points in the Neanderthal skull which I have most closely com- 
pared with other crania, have been—Ist, the projection of the supra- 
orbital ridges and glabella; 2nd, the receding forehead; 3rd, the 
shape of the occipital region. 
The supra-orbital ridges in the Neanderthal skull are characterized 
not only by their great projection forward, but by their rounded 
massive form. They extend outwards as far as the external orbital 
processes, and they run into each other across the middle line at the 
prominent glabella. Their extent and projection, as is clearly shown 
in the figure (from a photograph by Dr. Fuhlrott) in Mr. Huxley’s 
work, are due to the excessive development of the frontal sinuses. 
* It may be sufficient to mention here the occasional development on the 
occipital bone of an additional process called paramastoid, and of a process, 
the supra-condyloid, springing from the humerus a short distance above the 
inner condyle. An elaborate description of all the different forms which the latter 
process presents in Man and a comparison of their arrangement in certain of the 
Mammalia, as in many Quadrumana, Carnivora, Marsupialia, &c., is given by 
Gruber, in the ‘Mém. de l Acad. Imp. de St. Pétersbourg, vol. viii. 1859. 
+ These sinuses are cavities in the frontal bone due to a want of parallelism 
between the two plates, of which the bone is constructed. They contain air, and 
communicate with the nose. 
