ANCIENT MAN IN AFRICA AND JAVA 253 
in such graves were contemporaries of the Neolithic 
people of Europe. These predynastic graves, and the 
ancient Egyptians buried in them, have been examined 
and described by Professor Elliot Smith :* — 
" The early predynastic graves consist of shallow 
pits of a broad oval or rectangular form, scraped in 
the gravel or fine, yellow-grey alluvium, immediately 
beyond the area of cultivation. . . . The body was 
buried lying usually on the left side, with the arms 
and legs loosely flexed, the hands being between the 
knees and the face. The head was usually directed 
towards the south, or what those primitive people 
considered south. . . . With the dead were buried 
many objects which the deceased had treasured in 
this life, or his friends believed he might need in a 
future existence : pottery, vessels of stone, slate 
palettes, ivory figures, beads, occasional objects 
made of gold and copper, knives, and weapons made 
of flint and other stone. 
" The predynastic or proto-Egyptian was a man 
of small stature, his mean height estimated at a little 
under 5 feet 5 inches in the flesh for men, and 
almost 5 feet in the case of women, being just about 
the average for mankind in general, whereas the 
modern Egyptian y^/A?/; averages about 5 feet 6 inches. 
He was of a very slender build, for his bones are 
singularly slight and free from pronounced rough- 
nesses and projecting bosses that indicate great 
muscular development. In fact, there is a suggestion 
of effeminate grace and frailty about his bones which 
is lacking in the more rugged outlines of the 
skeletons of his more virile successors. . . . 
" So far as their physical characteristics are con- 
cerned, the predynastic Egyptians are probably the 
nearest approximation to that anthropological ab- 
straction — a pure race — that we know of. About 2 
per cent, of them are definitely negroid, and perhaps 
' The Anciefit Egypiiitiis^ Harper Brothers, 191 1. 
