CRANIOLOGY OF PEOPLE OF INDIA. 711 



facial indices is not uniform. The cephalic indices varied in the collective groups from 

 3*8 to 7'1, with a mean range of 5 '5, whilst the vertical indices, which varied from 2 '6 

 to 9'1, had a mean range of 5"3, so that the mean proportionate length of the cranium 

 to its breadth was almost the same as to its height. The gnathic indices, obtained by 

 Flower's method, varied from 07 to 8*5, with a mean range of 5 "47. On the other 

 hand, the other indices showed a much wider extent of variation in the groups. 

 The nasal index ranged from 0'2 to 14'5, with a mean 9*4; the orbital index from 

 2*7 to 25'3, with a mean 13'7 ; the palato-maxillary index from 6'2 to 25, with a 

 mean 16 "8. 



It should be stated that the thirty- nine Dravidian skulls, from which the mean 

 indices were computed in the Table, with eight exceptions, had the cephalic index 

 below 75, that in six of these this index ranged from 75 to 75*6, in one was 76'6, in one 

 771. The Dravidian skull therefore was dolichocephalic, as defined by its conventional 

 numerical limit, and when in the few exceptional cases it was 75 or a little higher, 

 the excess was mostly fractional, and below not only the brachycephalic but also the 

 upper range of the mesaticephalic standard. The vertical index in the groups was 

 either hypsicephalic, high skulls, 75*1 and upwards ; or metriocephalic,* moderately high 

 skulls, 70'1 to 75 ; in only two skulls was the index chamsecephalic, low skulls, index 

 below 70. In the gnathic index, which expresses more or less precisely the projection 

 of the front of the upper jaw, the skulls were either orthognathous, index below 98 ; or 

 mesognathous, index from 98 to 103 ; only one skull was prognathous, index 104'4. 



Of the other more variable indices the nasal had the smallest range. It fluctuated 

 between 43 "8 and 58 "9. Fourteen skulls were platyrhine, fourteen were mesorhine, 

 seven only were leptorhine. The orbital index ranged from 71*8 to 106, but twenty- 

 five had low microseme orbits, six had orbits of moderate height, mesoseme, whilst in 

 eight the orbits were high and rounded in outline, or megaseme. The palato-maxillary 

 diameters furnished five with dolichuranic indices, five with raesuranic, and fourteen 

 with brachy- or hyperbrachyuranic indices. 



In regard to the range of variation in the respective indices, the analysis of the 

 Dravidians shows that in these dolichocephalic skulls the indices, based on the proportions 

 between the length, breadth, and height of the cranium, have a much less range than 

 those in which the measurements embraced either partially or wholly the facial bones. 

 In this respect the analysis corresponded generally with the results recorded in my 

 Challenger Report already referred to. As regards the orbital and nasal indices, Paul 

 Broca many years ago t had recognised this character and had dwelt on the perturbing 

 influence of the individual variations in the nasal index. The greater constancy of the 

 cephalic and vertical indices, and of the gnathic index also, though the last is 

 sometimes more variable, justified the value which Anders Eetzius recognised when 



* For the reasons given in my previous memoirs I use the term metriocephalic, expressing moderate relative 

 height, in preference to that of orthocephalic employed by many craniologists. 

 t Revue d'Anthropologie, 1875 and 1876. 



