ON ANCIENT REMAINS IN ABYSSINIA. 563 



APPENDIX. 



On the Morphological Characters of the Ahijssinians. By J. G. Gaeson, 

 M.B., V.P., Anthrop. hist., Gorresp. Memb. Anthrop. Soc. Paris and 

 Berlin. 



The data for this paper are a series of observations made by Mr. J. 

 Theodore Bent during his expedition to Abyssinia on 46 male natives 

 between the ages of twenty and forty years, 22 of whom belong to the 

 Tigre tribe, 12 to the Amhara tribe, 4 to the Hamasan tribe, 1 to the 

 Bogos tribe, 6 to the Galla tribe, and 1 to the Barea tribe. The first 

 four tribes are members of the Himyaritic group of Semites, the Gallas 

 are Hamites, and the Barea are one of the unclassified tribes. 



The colour of the skin of the Himyaritic tribes is generally a rich 

 chocolate, but sometimes cases of a dark yellow-brown or dark-olive hue 

 occur. The Gallas are generally darker, being usually of a sooty-biack 

 colour ; the Barea is also sooty-black. The eyes are dark, and a vestige 

 of afraenum occurs in many cases at the inner angle of the eye. The hair 

 is black and curly. The profile of the nose is uniformly straight. Pro- 

 gnathism of the mouth is generally very slight or entirely absent, except 

 in the Gallas, where it is more marked than in the others. The lips 

 are of medium thickness, but are somewhat thicker in the Gallas than 

 in the other tribes. Platyprosopism, or flatness of face, predominates 

 throughont all the tribes, but is slightly more marked in the Amhara 

 than in the others. 



The cephalic index varies from 64 to 88, but chiefly centres between 

 76 and 79, the mean index of the series being 78-5, which places them in 

 the mesaticephalic group. In the Amhara tribe it averages 81 '4, in the 

 Tigre 78'2, in the Grallas 79. The module of the head averages 168, as 

 obtained from the length, breadth, and height of the calvara added 

 together, and, after 15 mm. has been added to represent the distance 

 from the meatus to the basion, divided by 3 ; from the length and breadth 

 added together and divided by 2 it is 165. The nasal index averages in 

 the Tigre 68-1, in the Amhara 74-2, and in the Gallas 76-2. According 

 to Broca's divisions of this index in the living, the Tigre are leptorhine 

 and the others are mesorhine. 



The mean stature of the series is 1°''693, the shortest being l™-593 

 and the tallest 1™'870. The Amhara tribe averages about 2 cm. taller 

 than the Tigre. The trunk, neck, and head are 50'3 per cent, of the 

 stature, and the lower limbs from the level of the tuberosities of the 

 ischia downwards are 49-7 per cent, of the stature. The canon of pro- 

 portion of the various parts of the body to the height are as follows : 

 Trunk, 32 per cent. ; neck, 5'3 per cent. ; head, 13 per cent. ; the thigh, 

 from the level of the tuberosities of the ischia, 23'2 per cent. ; the leg 

 and height of foot, 265 per cent. ; the length of the foot, 14-5 per cent. ; 

 the entire upper limb, 44*9 per cent., the upper arm being 172 per cent., 

 the forearm 16'2 per cent., and the hand 11-2 per cent. The length of 

 the forearm to that of the npper arm gives an index of 96 ; while the leg 

 and height of foot together give, with the portion of thigh from the ischial 

 plane to the knee, an index of 1143. 



Although the tribes examined are all members of the Caucasian 

 family, the Gallas and the Barea are more negroid in their characters than 

 the Semitic tribes, probably from longer contact with the negro and 



o o 2 



