146 TLLUSTRATIONS OF THE SIGNIFICANCE OF 
liable to be exaggerated by an artificial flattening of the occiput, such 
as is practised by many American and Polynesian tribes.”* In the 
game Decade another skull of the type most dissimilar to this, is de- 
scribed and illustrated. It was recovered in fragments from the re- 
markable chambered barrow at West Kennet, Wiltshire; and 
its most characteristic features are thus defined by Dr. Thur- 
nam :—‘‘It is decidedly dolichocephalic, narrow, and very flat 
at the sides, and realizes more nearly than any we have yet 
had to figure the kumbecephalic or boatshaped form described by 
Dr. D. Wilson. The frontal region is narrow, moderately arched and’ 
elevated at the vertex, but slopes away on each side. The parietal 
region is long, and marked by a prominent ridge or carina in the line 
of the sagittal suture, which is far advanced towards obliteration, 
whilst the other sutures are quite as perfect as usual. The occiput is 
fulland prominent ; the supra-occipital ridges only moderately marked. 
There is a deep digastric groove, and aslight paroccipital process on 
each side. The external auditory openings are somewhat behind the 
middle of the skull, and very much behind a vertical line drawn from 
the junction of the coronal and sagittai sutures.’’ Its extreme length 
and breadth are 7°7 and 5:1, and an inequality in the development of. 
the two sides is obvious in the vertical view. As the brachycephalic 
skull recalls certain American and Polynesian forms, so such examples, 
of the opposite type suggest the narrow and elongated skulls of the 
Australians and Esquimaux: and he thus proceeds :—‘‘ The Ballard 
Down skull bears marks of artificial flattening of the occiput; this. 
calls to mind the artificial lateral flattening of the skull characteristic 
of the ancient people called Macrocephali, or long-heads, of whom. 
Hippocrates tells us, that ‘while the head of the child is still tender, 
they fashion it with their hands, and constrain it to assume a length- 
ened shape by applying bandages and other suitable contrivances,, 
whereby the spherical form of the head is destroyed, and it is made 
to increase in length.’ This mode of distortion is called by Dr. Gosse 
the temporo-parietal, or ‘téte aplatie sur les cétés. It appears to- 
have been practised by various people, both of the ancient and modern 
world, and in Europe as well as the East. The so-called Moors, or 
Arabs of North Africa, affected this form of skull ; and even in modern 
times, the women of Belgium and Hamburgh are both described as 
compressing the heads of their infants into an elongate form. Our 
own observations lead at least to a presumption that this form of arti-- 
* Crania Britannica, Dec. ve pl. 45. 
