Man, Past and Present

by A. H. Keane

The Lagoa-Santa Race.

Rivet[745] points out that from Brazil to Terra del Fuegia on the Atlantic slope, in Bolivia and Peru, on the high plateaux of the Andes, on the Pacific coast and perhaps in the south of California, traces of a distinct race are met with, sometimes in single individuals, sometimes in whole groups. This race of Lagoa Santa is an important primordial element in the population of South America, and has been termed by Deniker the Palaeo-American sub-race[746].

The men were of low stature but considerable strength, the skull was long, narrow and high, of moderate size, prognathous, with strong brow ridges, but not a retreating forehead. There is no reliable evidence as to the age of these remains. Hrdlička, after reviewing all the evidence says, "Besides agreeing closely with the dolichocephalic American type, which had an extensive representation throughout Brazil, including the Province of Minas Geraes, and in many other parts of South America, it is the same type which is met with farther north among the Aztec, Tarasco, Otomi, Tarahumare, Pima, Californians, ancient Utah cliff dwellers, ancient north-eastern Pueblos, Shoshoni, many of the Plains Tribes, Iroquois, Eastern Siouan, and Algonquian. But it is apart from the Eskimo, who form a distinct subtype of the yellow-brown strain of humanity[747]."

Rivet[748] adds that an examination of the present distribution of the descendants of the Lagoa-Santa type shows that they are all border peoples, in East Brazil, and the south of Patagonia and Terra del Fuegia, where the climate is rigorous, in desert islands of west and southern Chili, on the coast of Ecuador, and perhaps in California. This suggests that they have been driven out in a great eccentric movement from their old habitat, into new environment producing fresh crossings.

There is an absence of this high narrow-headed type throughout the northern part of South America, and a prevalence of medium or sub-brachycephalic heads which are always low in the crown. These are now represented by the Caribs and Arawaks, but there was more than one migration of brachycephalic peoples from the north.

Physical Type in North America.

To return to North America. As we have just seen Hrdlička recognises a dolichocephalic element in North America, and various ethnic groups range to pronounced brachycephaly. Nevertheless he believes in the original unity of the Indian race in America, basing his conclusions on the colour of the skin, which ranges from yellowish white to dark brown, the straight black hair, scanty beard, hairless body, brown and often more or less slanting eye, mesorrhine nose, medium prognathism, skeletal proportions and other essential features. In all these characters the American Indians resemble the yellowish brown peoples of eastern Asia and a large part of Polynesia[749]. He also believes that there were many successive migrations from Asia.

The differences of opinion between Hrdlička and other students is probably more a question of nomenclature than of fact. The eastern Asiatics and Polynesians are mixed peoples, and if there were numerous migrations from Asia, spread over a very long period of time, people of different stocks would have found their way into America. "It is indeed probable," Hrdlička adds, "that the western coast of America, within the last two thousand years, was on more than one occasion reached by small parties of Polynesians, and that the eastern coast was similarly reached by small groups of whites; but these accretions have not modified greatly, if at all, the mass of the native population[750]."

The inhabitants of the plains east of the Rocky Mountains and the eastern wooded area are characterised by a head which varies about the lower limit of brachycephaly, and by tall stature. This stock probably arrived by the North Pacific Bridge before the end of the last Glacial period, and extended over the continent east of the great divide. Finally bands from the north, east and south migrated into the prairie area. The markedly brachycephalic immigrants from Asia appear to have proceeded mainly down the Pacific slope and to have populated Central and South America, with an overflow into the south of North America. It is probable that there were several migrations of allied but not similar broad-headed peoples from Asia in early days, and we know that recently there have been racial and cultural drifts between the neighbouring portions of America and Asia[751]. Indeed Bogoras[752] suggests that ethnographically the line separating Asia and America should lie from the lower Kolyma River to Gishiga Bay.

Owing to these various immigrations and subsequent minglings the cranial forms show much variation, and are not sufficiently significant to serve as a basis of classification. In parts of North America the round-headed mound-builders and others were encroached upon by populations of increasingly dolichocephalic type—Plains Indians and Cherokees, Chichimecs, Tepanecs, Acolhuas. Even still dolichocephaly is characteristic of Iroquois, Coahuilas, Sonorans, while the intermediate indices met with on the prairies and plateaux undoubtedly indicate the mixture between the long-headed invaders and the round-heads whom they swept aside as they advanced southwards. Thus the Minnetaris are highly dolicho; the Poncas and Osages sub-brachy; the Algonquians variable, while the Siouans oscillate widely round a mesaticephalous mean.