348 REPORTS ON THE STATE Ol' SCIENCE. 



women included,' the Turkish soldieiy must have been responblble for 

 some race mixture. The Mussulman population amounted at one time 

 to at least one-third of the whole, and in 1881 was certainly more than 

 one-quarter. But these people, though generally called ' Turki ' on the 

 island, are not all Turk by provenance, for the great majority are of native 

 Cretan descent. 



Unfortunately their names give us no clue, and individuals can rai'ely 

 give any information as to their forbears beyond tlie second genera- 

 tion. 



The Turk of Asia Minor (though he still remains brachycophalic) is 

 himself a great mixture, and the problem becomes further involved when 

 we attempt to discriminate between half-breed descendants of Turks and 

 Cretan women and Moslems of pure Cretan blood. What we should 

 expect, however, is a higher cephalic index among the Mussulmans than 

 among the Christians, and this my figures show. 



The average breadth index of 124 Mussulmans is 79'9, and that of the 

 Christians from the same eparkhies 78'9. Taking the eparkhies in which 

 the largest number of Mussulmans were measured, the differences exceed 

 one unit — e.g., I'S, 1'4, 1'6, and 1-5. 



Two Cretan villages bear Slavic names, Sklavopoulos and Vulgaros, 

 but a list of the names of the inhabitants of the former contains no trace 

 of Slav nomenclature. 



Turning to the other observed difierence between the ancient and 

 modern Cretans, to what are we to attribute the increase in stature ? It 

 is dangerous to build anthropological conclusions on differences in stature. 

 They are often due to differences in fertility of soil or social condition. 

 The archreological evidence, however, tells in favour of better conditions 

 in the Bronze Age rather than the reverse. The effect of fertility is 

 probably seen in the relatively higher stature in the well-watered Avest of 

 the island. The reverse is best illustrated in the case of the arid island 

 of Gavdos, whose people are descended from Sphakiotes, yet whose mean 

 stature compares as 1632 mm. to 171.3 mm. 



Yet Sphakia is only rather better off as to its soil than Gavdos, 

 and some other explanation must be found for the Sphakiote stature 

 (194 persons), second to one only in the island, since theirs is a sterile 

 soil, largely composed of a steeply descending talus on which beats a fierce 

 Southern sun. 



Can it be that their ancestors, the ' Dorians,' were tall ? Across the 

 border of the 8000-feet range of the White Mountains another puzzle 

 awaits us. 



Here we have the greatest mean stature in Crete (166 persons), 

 1720 mm., and it is greater in the mountains than in the plains; for of 

 150 individuals 79 who live above an altitude of 1000 feet have an 

 avei-age .stature of 1737 mm., whereas 71 living below 1000 feet are 

 only 1702 mm. in height. The difference in the breadth index is also 

 well marked ; for the mountaineers it is 77*4 and the lowlanders 803. 

 We have no traditions of special ' Dorian ' influence, and the cephalic 

 index does not favour it ; but from time immemorial the Lakkiotes, 

 who form the majority of these 79 mountaineers, have been noted for 

 their beauty, stature, and courage. It was among them, and especially 

 their neighbours in Selino, that I met quite an appreciable number of 

 auburn or fair-haired and blue-eyed pei'sons. They seem to be the Scotch 



