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HAWAIIAN SKULLS 



35 



COAST. 



The Infraorbital Suture 



Halbertsma, in 1859, described a suture which extended upward from 

 the infraorbital foramen into the floor of the orbit. In 1885, Turner re- 

 described this suture. In examining the Hawaiian crania with reference to 

 its presence, I find that in the cave series it was found in twenty-two examples. 

 In the.coast crania it was present in eleven instances only. 



The malar bone holds varying relations to the maxilla in the region of 

 this suture. In nine of the cave series it joins that portion of the maxillary 

 margin lying to the outer side of the suture. In the coast series the malar 

 bone was so situated in but five examples. That the malar bone should ever 

 cross the suture is not mentioned either by Halbertsma or Turner, but I find 

 it so placed symmetrically in ten of the cave series and in six of the coast. 

 In this group of variations the infraorbital suture, of course, does not extend 

 into the orbit, but juts directly against the zygomatic process of the malar 

 bone. The following observations were made upon three crania in which the 

 entrance of the zygomatic process into the composition of the lower orbital 

 margin took place to the mesal side of the infraorbital suture asymmetrically. 



