TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION H. 801 



Important and interesting as are the facts which may be ascertained from a 

 study of a series of skulls regarding the size and form of the brain, it is evident 

 that there are distinct limits to the knowledge to be obtained from this source. 

 Much additional information as to racial characters would undoubtedly be gained 

 had we collections of brains at all corresponding in number and variety with the 

 skulls in our museums. We know that as a rule the brains of the less civilised 

 races are smaller, and the convolutions and fissures simpler, than those of the more 

 cultured nations, beyond this but little more than that definitely determined. 



As the results of investigations in human and comparative anatomy, physiology, 

 and pathology, we know that definite areas of the cerebral cortex are connected 

 ■with the action of definite groups of muscles, and that the nervous impulses starting 

 from the organs of smell, sight, hearing, and common sensibility reach defined 

 cortical fields. All these, however, do not cover more than a third of the con- 

 voluted surface of the brain, and the remaining two thirds are still to a large extent 

 a terra incognita so far as their precise function is concerned. Is there a definite 

 localisation of special mental qualities or moral tendencies, and if so where are 

 they situated ? These are problems of extreme difficulty, but their interest and 

 importance are difficult to exaggerate. In the solution of this problem anthro- 

 pologists are bound to take an active and important part. When they have 

 collected information as to the relative development of the various parts of the 

 higher brain in all classes of mankind with the same thoroughness with which they 

 have investigated the racial peculiarities of the skull, the question will be within a 

 measurable distance of solution. 



The following Papers and Reports were read : — 



1. Skulls from Round Barfows in East Yorkshire.^ 

 By William Wright, M.B., lU.Sc, F.R.C.S. 



The skulls upon which these remarljs are off'ered are .some eighty in number, 

 and are n'.nv in the Mortimer Museum at Driffield. From the fact that the 

 interments closely resemble each other it is inferred that they took place about the 

 same time; from the further fact that primitive articles of bronze have been 

 occasionally met with in the graves, albeit much less frequently than articles of 

 stone and bone, it is assumed that they date back to the Early Bronze age, some 

 of them possibly to the Late Stone age. 



As to the skulls almost all the varieties of cranial shape met with in Europe 

 are represented : types so widely different are found as those named by Sei'gi 

 Ellipsoides Pelasyicus Lovyissimus, Sjihenoides Latus, and ElUpsoides Africus 

 Rotimdiis. The cephalic index ranged from G9 to 92. It is doubtful if it is 

 possible to find a materially more mixed series of skulls in a community of to-day. 

 Perhaps the only marked distinction between these prehistoric skulls and those of 

 the present time is to be found in the jaws and teeth, although even here retro- 

 grade changes were discoverable such as unerupted and dwarfed wisdom teeth, an 

 absent upper lateral incisor and a lower canine overlapping the adjacent lateral 

 incisor on account of overcrowding of the teeth. 



The mandibular and coronoid indices suggested by Professor Arthiu- Thomson, 

 were calculated whenever possible. I found no co-relation between them and 

 skuU-shape, but that skulls with similar indices were possessed of different shapes, 

 and vice versa. 



A marked resemblance was frequently noted between the skulls from any 

 one barrow : so striking was it that one was inclined to attribute it to the 

 barrows having been family burial-grounds. This resemblance was particularly 

 apparent in nine skulls taken from one barrow ; four of the nine, moreover, 

 although those of adults, had the metopic suture unclosed. Metopism, when 

 found, occurred in long skulls rather than in broad skulls ; a fact which on 

 a priori grounds one would perhaps not have expected. Judging from the 



' To be published in full in the Journal of the Anthrojwlo'iical Instiintc, sxxiv. 

 1903. ■ 3f 



