116 CRANIA AMERICANA. 



principally admired forms ; but that which tended to widen and elevate the head 

 appears to have greatly prevailed over the opposite extreme, which flattened and 

 elongated it in the horizontal direction. I have been at some pains to inquire 

 into the facts connected with this singular custom, as contained in the early 

 Spanish travellers and historians, and have gleaned the following particulars. 



Cie^a, one of the oldest authorities, states that " in the province of Anzerma, 

 and in that of Quinbaya, as well as in some other parts of this continent, when a 

 child is born they fix its head in the shape they wish it to retain ; thus some have 

 no occiput, others have the forehead depressed, and a third set have the whole 

 head elongated. This conformation is, in the first place, produced by the applica- 

 tion of small boards, and is subsequently continued by means of ligatures."* 



The same traveller adds the following notice of the Indians called Caraques, 

 near the Spanish settlement of Puerto Viejo. " At the birth of a child," says he, 

 " they mould its head, and then bind it between two boards, in such manner that 

 at the age of four or five years it remains either broad or long, or destitute of the 

 occipital prominence. They assert that this custom contributes to health, and 

 enables them to carry greater burthens."t 



Torquemada, also writing of the Peruvians, has the following passage. " As 

 to the custom of appearing fierce in war, it was in some provinces ordered that 

 the mothers or their attendants should make the faces of their children long and 

 rough, and the foreheads broad, as Hippocrates and Galen relate of the Macroce- 

 phali, who had them moulded by art into the elevated and conical form. This 

 custom is more prevalent in the province of Chicuito, than in any other part of 

 Peru."t 



The preceding quotations are satisfactory evidence, that the custom of distort- 

 ing the skull, was common in many provinces of Peru at the period of the Spanish 

 invasion ; that it was resorted to for the purpose of increasing the ferocity of the 

 countenance in war,— augmenting an imaginary grace,— and adding to the health 

 and strength of the body. It is also obvious that there were two principal modes 

 of eff'ecting this end, and that these were the opposites of each other. 



The following passage from Garcilaso de la Vega, proves that this fashion 

 was not introduced by the Incas, but was in use before they conquered the 

 country. He states that the Inca Huyna Capac, having invaded the province of 

 Manta with a view to its subjugation, found there a people who were living in the 



* Chronica del Peru, Cap. XXVI. f Loco citat. Cap. L. 



t Monarquia Indiana, T. II, p. 581. Fo/. Madrid^ 1723. 



