This wort has not been composed in that philosophic retirement which is so
favorable to investigation and reflection: on the contrary, you can bear witness
that I have pursued my course amidst the continued fatigue and anxiety of a
professional life; and this must be my apology, if the work I now submit to the
public does not embrace all the materials which are called for in such an undertaking.
X am, my dear sir,
Your very obliged friend and servant,
SAMUEL GEORGE MORTON.
Philadelphia, October 1, 1839.
P R E F A C E .
T he title of this work is perhaps sufficiently explanatory of its objects. The
principal design has been to give accurate delineations of the crania of more than
forty Indian nations, Peruvian, Brazilian and Mexican, together with a particularly
extended series from North America, from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic, and
from Florida to the region of the Polar tribes. Especial attention has also been
given to the singular distortions of the skull caused by mechanical contrivances
in use among various nations, Peruvians, Charibs, Natchez, and the tribes inhabiting
the Oregon Territory. The author’s materials in this department are ample,
and have enabled him to give a full exposition of a subject which was long
involved in doubt and controversy. Particular attention has been bestowed on the
crania from the Mounds of this country, which have been compared with similar
relics derived both from ancient and modern tribes, in order to examine, by the
evidence of osteological facts, whether the American aborigines, of all epochs, have
belonged to one Race, or to a plurality of Races.
I was, from the beginning, desirous to introduce into this work a brief chapter
on Phrenology; but, conscious of my own inability to do justice to the subject, I
applied to a professional friend to supply the deficiency. He engaged to do so,
and commenced his task with great zeal; hut ill health soon obliged him to
abandon it, and to seek a distant and more genial climate. Under these circumstances
I resolved to complete the Phrenological Table, and omit the proposed
essay altogether. Early in the present year, however, and just as my work was
ready for the press, George Combe, Esq., the distinguished phrenologist, arrived in
this country; and I seized the occasion to express my wants to that gentleman,
who, with great zeal and promptness, agreed to furnish the desired Essay, and
actually placed the MS. in my hands before he left this city. It is with great