Volume 1

Memoirs read before the Anthropological Society of London.

Date:
1865-1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Memoirs read before the Anthropological Society of London. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

    27/612 (page 15)
    should be remarked that the occipital vertebra of the Negress is more spacious than that of the Negro. Tiedemann asserted that the brain of the Negro did not resemble that of the Oran-titan more than that of the Euro- pean^ except in the more symmetrical distribution of the gyri and sulci. Tiedemann also denied Sommering's assertion that the nerves of the Negro are larger^ in proportion to the brain, than in the European; but Pruner Bey has confirmed Sommer- ing''s opinion. There seems to be, generally, less difference between the Negro and the Negress,* than between the European male and female: but on the other hand, the Negress, with the shortened humerus, presents a disadvantage which one might be tempted to look at as a return to the animal form (Pruner). Law- rence says,t the Negro structure approaches unequivocally * The Negress.— Before reviewing tlie cHef varieties -which the Negro type offers to travellers, it is necessary to cast a glance at the Negress. She possesses a cranium shorter, rounder, and wider in the posterior part of the middle vertebra; the parietal protuberances are more prominent, the apertures of the orbits frequently nearly circular, characters which approach her a little to the European female. As regards stature and the length of the hair, as weU as in the proportions of the parts composing the inferior limb, the Negress resembles her husband more than the European female re- sembles her husband. As regards the latter point, it is not rare to find also in Europe, females of high stature and a muscular aspect. The features of the face do not, in the two sexes of the Sudan, present the same differences as in the Aryan race. The mammse are less rounded, but already more conical in eai-ly age. Their relaxing is rapid and excessive. This peculiarity is, however, though in a less degree, found in Oriental females in other places, and of different origin. The pelvis presents, as regards width, some advan- tage over that of the male; the iliac bones are inclined towards the horizon, thinning towards the centre, without, however, being transparent; the haunches are rounder, steatopygy (fatty lumps on the buttocks) is only ex- ceptionally met with. The neck of the matrix is large and elongated; the aperture of the vagina has a forward direction, despite of the incHnation of the pelvis. (Pruner Bey.) t Mr. Lawrence thus summarises the chief physical characters of the Negro The chai-acters of the Ethiopian variety, as observed in the genuine Negro, tribes, may be thus summed up :—1. Narrow and depressed forehead; the entire cranium contracted anteriorly; the cavity less, both in its cu-cumfer- ence and transverse measurements. 2. Occipital foramen and condyles placed farther back. 3. Large space for the temporal muscles. 4. Great develop- ment of the face. 5. Prominence of the jaws altogether, and particularly of their alveolar margins and teeth; consequent obliquity of the facial line. 6. Superior incisors slanting. 7. Chin receding. 8. Very large and strong zygomatic arch projecting towards the front. 9. Large nasal cavity. 10. Small and flattened ossa nasi, sometimes consolidated, and running into a point above.—Lectures on Physiology, Zoology, and the Natural History of Man 1819, p. 363.