MEMOIRS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



203 



over 16 per ceut are tri tubercular, 18 or over 48i per cent have tubercles 3, and the remaining 

 or slightly over 35 per cent have four tubercles well developed. 



From a careful consideration of the facts here set forth it would seem that the nearest allies 

 of the ancient inhabitants of the Salado Valley, if we judge from the prevalence of dental decay, 

 are the Peruvians upon the one hand, in whom caries was almost as frequent, and the Mound 

 Builders of the Mississippi Valley ou the other, who also suffered to a considerable extent from 

 tooth-decay. Whether we are to accept the dental condition described as indicating aflinity or 

 whether they are to be regarded as the effects of climate, food, and general habits of life we 

 are not prepared to say; but it is more than probable that they have a certain value as express- 

 ing race affinity. 



The facts relating to the structure of the teeth themselves are important, and we are disposed 

 to attach more weight to them, so far at least as evidence of affinity is concerned, than to the 

 other two classes combined. The high percentage of the tritubercular second molar in the 

 Alaskan Indians, 67 per cent, is significant and betokens either in neb. commingling or a very near 

 relationship with Eskimos. In a like manner the percentage of 62 among the Californians is sug- 

 gestive of near affinity with the inhabitants of Alaska. The Mound Builders, Salado Valley 

 people, and Peruvians on the other hand are very closely related in this respect, as is indicated by 

 the percentages 40, 39, and 30, while the Sionx stand considerably apart from the rest with a per- 

 centage of only 16. 



TABLE B. Tuberculation among different American peoples. 



$ 27. THE HYOID BONE. 

 [By JACOB L. WORTMAX, M. I)., Anatomist of the Army Medical Museum.} 



The following study of the human hyoid arch has been undertaken with a view to the deter- 

 mination of the more exact value of this series of bones in matters of anthropological research. The 

 subject has received so little attention at the hands of anatomists, especially from this particular 

 standpoint, that there is little or no literature upon it, and we are as yet in comparative igno- 

 rance regarding the conditions and characteristics of this chain of bones, even in the best anatom- 

 ically known races of mankind. 



The history of this undertaking dates from the author's connection with the Hemenway South- 

 western Archaeological Expedition to the valley of the Salado, Arizona, in 1887, whither he was 

 sent by the United States Army Medical Museum to obtain a full series of skeletons of the ancient 

 dwellers of this region. While engaged in the collection of this material it was noticed that the 

 body or middle piece of the hyoid bone was almost always free, and that the separate pieces, of 

 which the hyoid arch is made up, seldom united into a single bone, even in the most aged indi- 

 viduals. The hyoid, as the writer had been accustomed to see it in skeletons of whites and 

 negroes, consisted usually of a single TJ-shaped bone, especially if the individual had passed the 

 middle point of life ; and upon consulting a few standard text-books on human anatomy which had 

 been taken into the field for ready reference it was found that this was regarded as the usual or 

 normal condition. 



( j The attention of Dr. Herman ten Kate, the anthropologist of the expedition, was called to 

 the subject, and together we took accurate note of the probable ages, conditions of bone disease, 

 ete., of all the individuals whose hyoids were secured. In all there were obtained some 97 speci- 



