Abstract
Polynesian Anthropometry.—Prof. Wood Jones prefaces a discussion of the anthropometry of the Polynesians in Man for April with certain preliminary considerations which he commends to the attention of anthropologists: First, that the question of the origin of the race has been obscured by a tendency to confuse the point of their mixed origin with that of a tendency to hybridisation shown in the agelong toleration of admixture with alien blood; secondly, that anthropologists have neglected the methods of their fellow-workers in other branches of zoology, though recently Sir Arthur Keith has brought the study into line by regarding human races as varyingly perfected stages of human evolution; tKirdly, correlation of growth must not be overlooked; for example, the correlation in length of vertebral column, base of skull, and maximum head-length. Turning more specifically to Polynesia, can anthropometric methods demonstrate, aside from recent admixture, the original blending of separate racial elements in the formation of a Polynesian type? Sullivan's observations were summed up by him as demonstrating two races in Polynesia. This was based on a method of selecting one characteristic and noting the status in a series in regard to other features; thus from an examination of “23 tallest men”, “21 shortest men”, and so forth. But in view of the zoological principle mentioned above, the results probably denote no more than that they represent the tallest and shortest individuals with the usual correlations of head and face. The same distinctive classification is obtainable from Burton's tables of Australian aborigines, but no one would suggest that this homogeneous group is derived from the crossing of two racial strains. The same criticism applies to the frequently repeated classification of the bones and skulls found in English Church crypts into ‘conquerors’ and ‘conquered’—‘Romans’ and ‘British’, ‘Saxons’ and ‘Danes’.
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Research Items. Nature 125, 685–687 (1930). https://doi.org/10.1038/125685a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/125685a0