piu si diseostera dalla brutezza, tanto piii si awicinera alia bel-
lezza.”—Lib. iii. — 84.
The facial line of Camper is proposed as a measurement of the
relative size and perfection of the head and face. It is a line
drawn from the prominence of the forehead to the most projecting
part of the upper jaw at the sockets of the cutting teeth*.
This method may assist the draughtsman, but it is not philosophically
correct. To measure the perpendicular line there must
be a horizontal line, and that which Camper has taken is subject to
variation; and the inclination of this line will depend more on the
prominence of the upper jaw and frontal sinuses than on the general
form of the head, or the distinctive peculiarities of the bones of the
face and cranium. Accordingly, it is found that the skulls of different
nations, and of individuals of the same nation, agree in the
facial line, while there are marked distinctions in the forms of the
cranium and face, in the air and character of the whole head, as well
as the particular features.
The linea occipitalis was a line used by Daubenton for the purpose
of measuring the differences of the crania of man and brutes.
One line was drawn from the posterior margin of the occipital
foramen to the inferior margin of the orbit; another horizontally
* See Plate II. fig. 4 and 5.
through the condyles of the occipital bone. These two lines embraced
the jawbones, and their angle was the measure of the comparative
size of the cranium and face.
Blumenbach says, this method may be adopted to measure the
degrees of comparison betwixt man and brutes, but certainly not
the varieties existing in national character. For, says he, I find
the occipital line differing in the skulls of two Turks and in three
Ethiopians: and, he continues, the facial line of Camper is ineffectual
from a contrary imperfection, since it is the same in skulls
totally differing in character.
The Norma Verticalis of Blumenbach. Blumenbach was about
to enter on a careful observation of the varieties in the national
and individual character as discoverable in the skull, and he found,
as was to be expected, that neither the systems of Daubenton,
Camper, or Durer would answer his purpose. His method is to
select two bones, the frontal bone from those of the cranium, and
the superior maxillary bone from those of the face, and to compare
them with each other. For this purpose he looks vertically on the
head, and placing the great convexity of the cranium directly before
him, he marks the projections of the maxillary bone beyond the
arch of the forehead.
It is obvious that in this manner of comparing the bones of the
cranium and face, we cannot see the depth of the bones of the face,