BLOODGROUPS IN RELATION TO RACE IN THE DUTCH 

 EAST INDIES 



H. J. T. BIJLMER 



Ambon, Dutch East Indies 



During the fourth Pacific Science Congress held in Java in 1929, Prof. 

 Kleiweg de Zwaan suggested the forming of a "standard committee" on 

 bloodgroups, which committee was afterwards established under his 

 chairmanship. 



My position as military medical inspector of the Moluccas enabled me 

 to study bloodgroups in several parts of this group of islands, which forms 

 the eastern half of the Indo- Australian Archipelago. This was of special 

 importance because of the fact that the Moluccas have a population that 

 differs principally from that of the western part of the said Archipelago. 

 The latter includes mainly the four Major Sunda Islands Java, Sumatra, 

 Borneo and Celebes, which are populated for a great deal by Malay tribes 

 of Mongoloid appearance. The eastern part of the Indian- Australian 

 Archipelago however is inhabited by Malay tribes, in which the Mongoloid 

 strain is far less apparent. Instead the frizzly-haired Papuan has clearly 

 put his seal and therefore the population of the Moluccas as well as that of 

 the Minor Sunda Islands might be called with reason Melanesians, as we 

 may understand by that denomination a mixture of Malayo-Polynesians 

 and Papuans. Now Mongols and Papuans are anthropological antagonists 

 and so it naturally follows that one should look for a conspicuous difference 

 in bloodgroup condition. 



In the western — as we might say Mongoloid — part of the Archipelago 

 the bloodgroup B is predominant and according to the four fairly large 

 investigations on Javanese and men of Sumatra of Bais, Verhoef, v.d. 

 Made and Einthoven-Schuil it amounts to some 30 per cent. The A group 

 is somewhat lower and so the Biochemical Race Index is less than 1, viz. 

 0.8 to 0.9. Only Dr. Miss v.d. Made in her large investigation on 10,000 

 Javanese got an index of a little above 1 for the men and one of exactly 1 for 

 the women. The zero group amounts for the Javanese to 35 to 40 per cent 

 and for the Sumatra men from 34.5 (Einthoven-Schuil) to 43.7 (Bais- Ver- 

 hoef). 



Passing to the eastern, more Melanesian part of the Indian Archipelago 



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