VI : THE FORM OF THE HUMAN SKULL 



THE form of the human skull is a matter 

 which has engaged the attention of anat- 

 omists for many years : with increasing 

 insistence since Blumenbach, in the latter part of 

 the eighteenth century, published his Decas 

 Collections suae Craniorum Diver sarum Gentium ; 

 and is now, in these our own days, exciting a new 

 and ever-enlarging interest. There is little cause 

 for wonder in this when one reflects upon the fact 

 that the shape of the human skull has, or is sup- 

 posed to have, a very marked bearing upon that 

 branch of the evolutionary question which deals 

 with the origin of man's body. The skull, that is 

 the cranial portion as distinct from the facial, is the 

 enveloping capsule which protects the brain the 

 central organ of the nervous system and the size, 

 at least of the latter, can with some certainty be 

 calculated from the capacity of the shell in which 

 it lay. Hence a vast amount of attention has been 

 paid to the examination of the skulls of the lower 

 races, to the skulls of pre-historic men and women, 

 and particularly to those few battered fragments 

 which at present we regard as having belonged to 

 some of the earliest denizens of this planet. It is 

 no part of the intention of this article to deal with 

 the question of evolution in its larger bearings, 

 nor even of the evolution of man's body, the cor- 

 poreal prison which encages his soul, and through 



