316 Notes on Human Remains from Woodyates, Wiltshire. 



and Woodyates skulls resemble one another more closely than those 

 of Rotherley. The least individual variety occurs amongst the 

 Rotherley skulls — they are the most homogeneous group. On the 

 other hand, individual variety is greatest in the Woodyates specimens, 

 while the Woodcuts skulls in this respect occupy a mean position 

 between those from Kotherley and Woodyates. There are, of course, 

 specimens in each set which show similar fundamental characters, 

 particularly in the Woodcuts and Woodyates series. As minute 

 details regarding the differences between the three sets of specimens 

 are somewhat technical, and therefore tedious, except to those 

 specially interested in the subject, I shall only point out the 

 differences between them indicated by the form of the calvaria and 

 nasal portion of the face. The cephalic index shows that the 

 dolichocephalic element is most strongly marked in the Rotherley 

 specimens, only one specimen out of thirteen being brachycephalic, 

 and three mesaticephalic, while six are dolichocephalic, and three 

 hyperdolichocephalie. Of the Woodcuts specimens one is brachy- 

 cephalic, eight are mesaticephalic, while five are dolichocephalic. 

 The Woodyates specimens show the greatest tendency to brachy- 

 cephaly, the greater number of the mesaticephalic skulls from 

 there being at the upper end of that group, while the greater 

 number of the mesaticephalic skulls from Woodcuts are at the lower 

 end, that approaching the dolichocephalic group. In the nasal 

 characters, the platyrhine form is not present either at Rotherley or 

 Woodcuts, while the leptorhine and mesorhine forms are present 

 in about the same proportion. This comparison of the characters of 

 the skull shows that the Woodyates specimens belonged to a more 

 mixed race than the inhabitants of Rotherley, while the Woodcuts 

 people were intermediate in this respect. It also shows that the 

 people in the neighbourhood of Woodyates did not live isolated from 

 the Roman population, as the Rotherley people evidently did more 

 or less, but mixed and inter-bred with them. As far as I am able to 

 judge from the characters of the skull, there does not seem to be 

 any evidence present of crossing with the Celtic population of 

 Britain, and I am inclined to think that we have here to deal with 

 a crossing between the Roman and early dolichocephalic British race. 



