296 PRINCIPAL SIR W. TURNER ON 



Naga Hills, the valley of Manipur, and the head- waters of the Chindwin and Irrawaddy 

 rivers. From the last-named region offshoots colonised the Chin Hills, Lushai land, 

 Cachar, and the valley of the Irrawaddy, and a swarm called the Tai conquered the 

 mountainous country to the east of Burma. 



It will therefore be of interest at this stage to consider the physical characters of the 

 people living in the Tibeto-Burman region, and the configuration of their skulls. Although 

 the tribes occupying the mountains are warlike savages, so that opportunities for obser- 

 vation and the acquisition of specimens occur only occasionally, yet some facts are at our 

 disposal. 



Through the courtesy of several of my former pupils, I was able to examine and de- 

 scribe, in Part I. of this series of memoirs,* nineteen skulls of the Naga, Chin, and Lushai 

 mountaineers, and I would refer to it for a detailed description. Six Naga skulls, six 

 Chins, and three Lushais were either dolichocephalic or approximated thereto, and may 

 fitly be compared with the skull from the Kham province, t As with the Kham skull 

 the terms elongated and ovoid apply to the outline of their crania in the norma 

 verticalis, though in some the breadth in relation to the length was greater than in 

 others. In the Kham specimen the upper jaw was orthognathic, a character present in 

 the majority of the mountaineers. The face was broad, and in the Kham skull the 

 interzygomatic diameter was 131 mm., something more than the mean of the Chin- 

 Lushais, 127, but not quite so great as the mean of the Nagas, 134. In the Kham the 

 nasio-malar index was 107'3, in the mountaineers it ranged from 104/8 to 110, with 

 the mean 107 '5 : a close correspondence therefore existed in the degree of projection of 

 the bridge of the nose beyond the plane of the malar borders of the orbits. In the 

 Kham skull the nasal index was leptorhine, in the mountaineers four were leptorhine, 

 seven mesorhine, four platyrhine, a range of variation which, through paucity of 

 specimens, could not be determined amongst the Khams. As the features of re- 

 semblance correspond in so many important respects in the skull of the Kham with 

 those of the people of the Naga, Chin, and Lushai Hills, craniology lends support to the 

 opinion, based on affinities of language, that they belong to a common stock, for the 

 points of difference are no greater than may be found in the skulls of people of the 

 same race (PL X., figs. 51-53). 



In further extension of this question I may refer to two skulls obtained in an old 

 cemetery in Upper Burma, also described in Part I. of this series of memoirs,! in which 

 the dolichocephalic form and proportions and the mean leptorhine nasal index, at once 

 distinguished them from the brachycephalic type of the modern Burmese people. These 

 skulls therefore in all probability may be regarded as representing the offshoot of the 

 Tibeto-Burman stock, whioh, many centuries ago, penetrated into Burma from the 

 mountainous districts to the north, and in course of time became to a large extent dis- 

 placed by a brachycephalic people, allied in all probability to the Shans and Chinese. 



* Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin., vol. xxxix. p. 703, 1899. 



t Two Nagas, and two from the South Lushai Hills, were brachycephalic, and are not included in the comjiarison. 



I Op. cit., p. 736, pi. iii. fig. 14. 



