THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



451 



By Virginia Demont-Breton 



"EOEK OE THE SKA" THE FAIR-HAIRED TEUTON, OR NORDIC, TYPE 



Here a noted artist has recorded on canvas the distinctive physical attributes of a people 

 less vivacious than the Celts and possessing longer faces, lighter hair, and blue eyes (see 

 page 450). 



tained its largest extent. It embraced 

 all the countries on the Mediterranean as 

 well as a strip of land entirely surround- 

 ing the Black Sea. It also included 

 Britain, all the region now occupied by 

 the Rumanians in Transylvania, Ru- 

 mania proper and Bessarabia, and a still 

 larger territory between the Euphrates 

 and Tigris. Its strongly fortified north- 

 ern boundaries were the Rhine from its 

 mouth and the Danube as far as where 

 now stands the city of Budapest. More 

 than any other empire mankind had seen, 



it was the culmination and embodiment 

 of order, law, justice, and civilization. 



Beyond its northern frontiers in that 

 northern plain was seething another and 

 a fiercer world. It was uncivilized and 

 incoherent, a mere disorderly mass of 

 humanity, the direct opposite of every- 

 thing the Roman knew. The Teutonic 

 and Slavic tribes who occupied its un- 

 bounded area, incessantly fighting with 

 one another, were so constantly on the 

 move that, except in most general terms, 

 one cannot indicate the location of any. 



