161 



REPORT ON BONES FROM HARLYN BAY. 

 By JOHN BEDDOE, M.D., t,Z,-T>., F.R.S., V.P. Anthrop. Inst. 



Considerable interest may be attached to the stature and 

 physical development of these ancient Harlyn people, and to the 

 size of the long bones, which yield evidence on the subject. The 

 method of utilizing evidence of this kind has been studied by 

 several investigators. The matter is of great medico-legal as 

 well as anthropological interest. The great Orfila attacked it 

 from that point of view ; and he published a quantity of material 

 with the view of rendering it more easy to recognise the stature 

 of the deceased owners of separated limbs. Unfortunately, he 

 did not describe with sufficient precision his methods of measure- 

 ment. The supposed age and sex, the presence or absence of the 

 terminal cartilages, the degree of dryness and of decomposition 

 of animal matter, the position in which the bones (especially the 

 most imj)ortant one, the femur) are placed for measurement, the 

 inclusion or exclusion of terminal prominences, such as the 

 styloid processes, — all these differences, though some of them may 

 aj^pear trifling, bulk somewhat largely when the total length of 

 the body comes to be estimated. In the case of the arm-bones 

 the side chosen, right or left, may make a considerable difference : 

 the right arm is very generally longer in right-handed people ; 

 and so, apparently, but less distinctly, is the left leg. 



Orfila was followed by our countryman, Humphry, whose 

 figures were utilised by Thurnam and EoUeston. Quetelet only 

 touched the subject. Then Topinard, our great master in 

 physical anthropology, advanced it a stage, and put out a system 

 of computation, based on the jJi'oportion per cent, of the length 

 of each long bone to that of the whole body, which he stated, 

 however, to be only provisional, in the absence of what he 

 thought would be sufficient material. This plan, however, was 

 adopted by General Pitt-Eivers in his great book, with the result 

 that the Eomano-British villagers of Eotherley came out remark- 

 ably short. I followed next, and using chiefly Orfila' s, Humphry' s, 



