UPON THE SERIES OF PREHISTORIC CRANIA. 277 



peculiarities, viz. the posterior position of the parietal tubera 

 (p. 234 supra) and the vertical dip of the posterior half of the bone 

 (p. 235 supra ibique citata) so characteristic of the brachycephalic 

 skull, and so clearly indicative of a brain, pro tanto and ceteris pari- 

 bus, favourably conditioned and advantageously constituted. And 

 the rationale of a third craniographical distinction, that, namely, 

 which is given in the ' Antero-posterior Index' (p. 167 supra), lies 

 in its furnishing us with a more or less exact numerical expression 

 of the relative extent of the more favourably conditioned segments 

 of such brains. The average antero-posterior index of the dolicho- 

 cephalic skull as obtained from the measurements, given with the 

 descriptions, of the small number of ' Silurian ' skulls figured in Sec- 

 tion XV. of this volume, is 47 as against 52 for the average of the 

 brachycephalic ' Cimbric ' skulls, also figured here ; and this disad- 

 vantageous proportion is only reduced by a fraction amounting to J- 

 when we compare the average obtained from six other prehistoric 

 Silurian skulls not figured in this book with the average obtained 

 from six other brachycephalic skulls taken from Swiss, English, and 

 Tamil series. These figures may be taken as being strongly con- 

 firmatory of the other evidence for the inferiority of the Silurian 

 dolichocephalic to the Cimbric brachycephalic race which is fur- 

 nished by several other physical peculiarities (see p. 238 seqq. supra 

 and p. 279 infra), as well as by the historical or rather prehistorical 

 fact of its having been conquered and in some parts of this country 

 displaced and replaced by the later stock. 



To obtain, however, a complete idea of the characteristics of a 

 people, it is necessary not only to know what their stature and what 

 the proportions of their skull measurements may have been, both 

 in themselves and in relation to the brain-segments they covered ; 

 but to be able to reproduce to our view their complexion and the 

 colour of their eyes. These latter points indeed, of which the barrows 

 can tell us nothing, are to the ordinary traveller an enquiry at least 

 as interesting as even the stature, and though it is possible to 

 overrate their value and importance to the ethnologist, at all events 

 when he is dealing with races as capable of complete fusion as 

 those whose remains we are here concerned with, they still possess, 

 even for him, an interest which is little inferior to that of the less 

 perishable remains. 



In Europe at the present day we have the following combinations 



