CHAPTER XVII 



THE SPINOUS PROCESSES OF THE VERTEBRAL 



COLUMN 



In all works which deal with Comparative Anatomy, or 

 with Anthropology, much attention is devoted to the 

 human distinctions of poise of body. Various archi- 

 tectural features of the human body are modelled upon 

 a plan somewhat different from that seen in most other 

 animals, and these alterations of structural details are, 

 for the most part, associated with a typical human poise 

 of body. All these points have been eagerly seized upon 

 as definite and measurable human features, and without 

 turning aside now for any discussion of theories con- 

 cerning them, it is our business to see if any of these 

 features were impressed upon the body of Man as a result 

 of his philogenetic youth spent among the branches. 

 Most of the problems concern, in some measure, the 

 vertebral column as the central axis around which the 

 rest of the body is disposed. There are, for example, 

 the questions of the poise of the head upon the neck, 

 the presence of the sinuous curves of the vertebral column 

 —cervical, dorsal, lumbar, and sacral curvatures; the 

 actual method by which vertebra articulates with 

 vertebra; the varying size, shape, and number of the 

 elements which compose different regions of the cohimn; 

 and finally the manner in which the column articulates 

 with the pelvic girdle. 



We will start our examination of the backbone in a 

 somewhat irregular way by considering, not the general 

 curves and articulations of the whole column, but the 



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