1892.] Investigation at Tick Island. 571 
PLATYCNEMISM. 
It will be remembered that in recent years a marked lateral 
flattening of the tibiz has been noticed as a characteristic of 
early and savage races in various parts of the world. This 
flattening exists in a varying degree and is frequently found 
in connection with anterior curvature. Measurements are 
usually made where the nutrient artery enters the bone and 
the percentage of the lateral diameter as compared with the 
antero-posterior diameter, ascertained. 
According to Topinard (Anthropology p. 299 et seq.) the 
peculiarity was first commented upon in relation to the family 
buried at Cro-Magnon. He furthermore states that in two 
hundred Parisian tibiz dating from the fourth to the tenth 
centuries 5.25% were platyenemie while 14% were bent. 
Unfortunately the degree of flattening is not given. 
Prof. Wyman (Fresh Water Shell Mounds of the St. John’s 
River, Florida, page 67) says “the proportion of the transverse 
to the fore and aft diameter in whites as compared with 
Indians, comprising mound builders, is as follows: The fore 
and aft diameter being taken as 1.00 the transverse in twelve 
whites 0.70, in twelve from the mounds of Florida 0.64, in 
seven from mounds in Kentucky 0.63,in two from Osceola 
mound (a shell heap now known as Crow’s Bluff) 0.59, three 
from the mound on the St. Clair River 0.60, five from the 
mound on River Rouge 0.53, in an Aleutian islander 0.56, in 
an Eskimo 0.60, in a Californian 0.53, in a tibia from the 
Merrimac River 0.60, in a Peruvian 0.50, in a Gorilla (male) 
0.57, Gorilla, (female) 0.71, Chimpanzee 0.65.” It must be 
borne in mind that Prof. Wyman’s researches into the burial 
mounds of Forida were very superficial (see foot-note Fresh 
Water Shell Mounds, page 47) and his measurements pro- 
bably relate to tibiz of intrusive burials, though between the 
tibiæ of later Indians and those from original interments in 
various sand mounds of the St. John’s the difference in 
flattening is-not marked. 
Another point carefully to be borne in mind is that the 
measurement of a single tibia amounts to little in the estab- 
