Bovine Animals of Scandinavia. 



259 



Bos 



primigemus. 



roots of the horns, but lower down more or less hollowed out. 

 The nasal bone p. 2 



reaching up to the 

 line drawn between 

 the lower borders 

 of the orbits ; the 

 lower part of the 

 lachrymal bones a 

 little broader than 

 the upper; the di- 

 stance between the 

 orbits and the bases 

 of the horns is 

 double the diameter 

 of the orbit ; the oc- 

 cipital ridge straight 

 or rounded off back- 

 ward from the base of 

 one horn to the other, 

 and hollowed out be- 

 low so that it forms an acute angle ; foramen occipitale somewhat 

 higher than broad ; the horn-cores without pedicles, but with a 

 broad knotty ring round the root, are near the root directed out- 

 wards and somewhat backwards, in the centre curved forwards with 

 the points upwards*. The outer edge of the zygomatic process of 

 the temporal bone forms a right angle. A right line drawn be- 

 tween the points of the horns falls over the roots of the horn, 

 between them and the orbits. Atlas : its wings curved backwards, 

 oblique, much broader at the back, 10 inches 3 lines in breadth, 

 the upper arch convex, the lower with a compressed hump over 

 the hinder edge. Epistropheus short, the processus spinosus a 

 high rising ridge, inclining backwards, whose outer edge is thin, 

 the anterior angle rounded : along the under side of the vertebra 

 is a ridge which passes backwards over the edge of the cup-formed 

 articular surface ; foramen medulla spinalis, in front round, back 

 above cylindrical, below flat. The arterial foramen oval. 



The remaining bones in the skeleton resemble those of the 

 tame ox, with the exception of their magnitude, and like this 

 species, the Urox has thirteen pairs of rib-bones and six lumbar 

 vertebrae. As it would be far too diffuse to describe every single 

 bone, I will only give the dimensions of those which are dissi- 



* Precisely such a direction have the horns of our tame oxen, quite 

 contrary to the assertion of Bojanus and many others, who, in the unlike 

 direction of the horns, choose to find a specific difference between the 

 Urut and the Taurus. 



