ü
•if;
I I ;
] ?
I'-]
vn
I i »
P
.v«
>
i iii
232 CRANIA BBITANNIOA. [CHAP. IX.
there are no sufficient data at present to determine. Its unusual presence among Cretins, a
class of persons who are specially subject to diseases of the nervous system and of the bones,
excited the particular attention of Virchow *.
The prevailing bracliycephalism of the ancient races of the Britannic Isles was general over
all the tribes; and if it does not indicate homogeneity, which we shoiild not be justified in
affirming on this ground alone, it is at least an expression of resemblance which it is very important
to note. In Britain, in the Orkneys, in the Hebrides, and in Hibernia we have met
with nimierous brachycephalic skulls of the primeval people, of both sexes and of all ages. As
exemplifications of this position we may refer to the cranium from the Phoenix Park kistvaen,
Plate 55 (BIANII), which is very tall and is short, only just excluded from the proper brachycephali,
and to other specimens in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy; to that from the
Newbigging cist, Plate 21, and to another Orcadian from Bindall in our own collection (ORCADII) ;
to that from the Lesmurdie cist, Plate 16 (VACOMAGI) ; to that of the Kinaldie cist, Plate 25,
(TAIXAXI), which is doubtless the skull of an ancient Pict f ; to that from the Juniper Green
cist, Plate 15 (GADENI) ; to that from the Tosson cist, Plate 54 (OTABENI) ; to that from the
Green Gate Hill barrow. Plates 3 and 4, and that from the Gristhorpe tree coffin, Plate 52
(BRIGANTES) ; to that from the Caedegai barrow, Plate 23 (ORDOTICES) ; those from the Wetton
Hill barrow. Plates 12 and 34; that from the Ballidon Moor barrow, Plate 1 ; that from the
Parsley Hay barrow, Plate 2 (CORNAVII) ; that from the Hitter Hill barrow, Plate 53 ; that from
the Hay Top barrow, Plate 60, and that from Green Lowe, Plate 41 (CoRiTAi i i ) ; that from
Codford barrow, Plate 14, and those from the barrows on Roundway Down, Plates 42 and 43
(BELGIE); and to that from Ballard DOTO barrow, Plate 45 (DUROTUIGES). It is unnecessary
to mention many other examples that are or have been contained in different museums in these
islands, some of which are embraced in our Table I I . The instances enumerated have their
range over almost every part of the islands, and we have met mt h so many others that they
would tend to fill up the vacant districts. In the presence of dolichocephalic crania of many of
the tribes here mentioned, we cannot assert in the absolute manner of some craniologists that
the ancient Britons were brachycephalic, but only that they were a brachycephalous race. This
* It had been observed before by Dr. Fried. C. Stabl ia his barrow at Bole Hill (224 T of the Bateman collection) is
posthumously distorted, being flattened, lengthened, and heightened
by pressure. (Ten Tears'Diggings, pp. 147, 2/6.) One
imperfect calvarinm from Bingham Lowe (225 T of our Table
II.), which contained three very beautiful and delicate leafshaped
arrow-heads of semitrauslucent flint (¿¿.p. 95), such as
have been presumed on slender evidence to have preceded the
barbed flint arrow-heads, is seen to be brachycephalic, J '80.
Mr. Batemau's view of long barrows and chambered barrows
was not always so clearly and distinctly expressed as
might have been wished. In his enumeration of these barrows
(ill. p. 147) he mentions Bole Hill, just referred to, Stoney
Lowe, Ringham Lowe, and Five Wells Hill. Bole Hill appears
rather to have resembled our Hitter Hill Barrow (Plate 53),
which contained several stone cists, and might be designated a
muUilocular barrow rather than a chambered barrow. The
same seems to have been the case with Stoney Lowe also.
t The brachycephalism of this Pictish cranium is an evidence
of the indigenous origin of the Picts, and may go further to
dispose of one branch of the Pictish question than many arguments
formerly brought forth.
second work on Cretins, ' Neue Beiträge zur Physiognomik
und pathol. Anat. der Idiotia endemiea,' 2nd ed. 1851, S. 34.
The crania from the long barrows are, as we have seen, far
from being uniformly dolichocephalic, yet are frequently synostotic.
One of the crania of the Five Wells Hill galleried
tumulus, opened by Mr. Bateman in 1846 (89 T, List), that
of " a young person" (the age is probably at least 35), is scaphocephalic
from premature obliteration of the sagittal suture,
which is entirely effaced, while the rest of the sutures are
open. Mr. Bateman applied the term " narrow boat-shaped "
to three of the skulls from this barrow. How much he was influenced
in conferring such an appellation upon them by this
abnormal example canuot be ascertained; but it is not at all
uncertain that its great and unnatural length was the chief
foundation for the view he took of the series. Neither is
there any doubt that a calvarinm in our own collection (No. 1),
from this galleried barrow, has a comparative measurement of
length 1-00, breadth '7!), which is as near to the brachycephalic
category as possible.
The "skull of the primary interment " from the chambered
CHAP. IX.] CONCLUSION. 233
was their distinguishing and most peculiar characteristic, the prevailing type of their skulls, as
we first conclusively pointed out some years ago.
As in other brachycephalous races, extraneous influences have in some oases increased the
shortness and the tallness of the calvarium of the ancient Britons, but entirely in a different way
from that in which these are, or have been, purposely applied to mould and distort the skull. In
this manner the parieto-occipital flattening we have so frequently mentioned in our Descriptions
of individual crania has been produced. This deformation is commonly more marked on one side
than the other, and has been occasioned by a cause operating in early infancy, before the edges
of the cranial bones have been closely approximated, and whilst the sutures were somewhat open,
and the whole head represented a bladder-like body with flexible pañetes, containing a soft and
vascular mass of brain. Such a spheroidal body would have a tendency to assume a more or
less discoidal form by the distention of its periphery, in whatever position its vertical diameter
might be situated. Hence we see that, when it has been supported on the occiput, it has commonly
been a little inclined to one side or the other, which has occasioned increased flattening
towards this side of the occiput, and a corresponding flattening in the frontal region, though
towards the opposite side, whilst the peripheral parts of the spheroid have slightly bulged out.
We have been strongly inclined to attribute this involuntary deformation of the head among the
ancient Britons to the use of the cradle-board in nursing, as among the North American Indians;
and probably this may be the true explanation of such common and considerable deformity.
Our inquiries respecting brachycephalic races in which the same distortion is met with have not
at present materially tended to confirm this conjecture. In a series of skulls belonging to the
tribes of the southern slope of the Himalayas—Lepchas, Bodos, and Bhotias—this deformity is
occasionally met with; in one instance it has proceeded to a considerable degree, and has produced
much wryness; yet the best authorities are not acquainted with any use of a cradle-board by these
people. Among the brachycephaUo Thais of Siam this mark of occipital compression is common,
sometimes excessive and producing a wry head. Children are nursed for a long period by the
Siamese, but the utmost freedom is allowed to the infant; for it is generally devoid of every
article of dress, and rests its head on a soft pillow during repose.
It may be observed that we have met with comparatively few instances of disease among
the bones of the ancient Britons. The probability is that diseases of the bones were not common.
No morbid appearances, such as would be the result of syphilis, have presented themselves to our
notice; which is perhaps an evidence of no great weight either for or against the modern origin
of the subject of Pracastorio's muse. It may further be not unworthy of remark that abnormal
and morbid changes in the bones, lüíe synostoses, appear to be most observable in those interred
in the long barrows. In the Uley tumulus there were found two examples of anchylosis of the
vertebrce. In that of Rodmarton it was the same, and also in those of Nympsfield and Winterbourn
Stoke ; from which some of the measurements of our Table II. are derived.
We have now been long engaged in the study of the precincts, as it were, of the great
essential structure of man. All craniological investigations must ever be subsidiary to the
knowledge of the brain, the organ immediately connected with the manifestations of mind.
The skull is merely the case for this organ, but vitally related to it, neither the cerebrum nor the
cranium being independent of each other ; rather they reciprocally act upon each other, in growth
and during every other periodic change. This case is subject to variations of size and of form
almost endless in the different races of man. We know that these diversities are coincident with
and allied to disparities of powers, capacities, and character, which may be considered to a certain
m im