Three main types:—1. Southern dolichocephals, Mediterranean; 2. Northern Dolichocephals, Nordic; 3. Brachycephals, Alpine.
Physical Characters.
Hair: 1. Very dark brown or black, wiry, curly or ringletty. 2. Very light brown, flaxen, or red, rather long, straight or wavy, smooth and glossy. 3. Light chestnut or reddish brown, wavy, rather short and dull. All oval in section; beard of all full, bushy, straight, or wavy, often lighter than hair of head, sometimes very long. Colour: 1. Very variable—white, light olive, all shades of brown and even blackish (Eastern Hamites and others). 2. Florid. 3. Pale white, swarthy or very light brown. Skull: 1 and 2 long (72 to 79); 3 round (85 to 87 and upwards); all orthognathous. Cheek-bone of all small, never projecting laterally, sometimes rather high (some Berbers and Scotch). Nose, mostly large, narrow, straight, arched or hooked, sometimes rather broad, heavy, concave and short. Eyes: 1. Black or deep brown, but also blue. 2. Mainly blue. 3. Brown, hazel-grey and black.
Stature: 1. Under-sized (mean 1.630 m. 5 ft. 4 in.), but variable (some Hamites, Hindus, and others medium or tall). 2. Tall (mean 1.728 m. 5 ft. 8 or 9 in.). 3. Medium (mean 5 ft. 6 in.), but also very tall (Indonesians 1.750 m. to 1.830 m. 5 ft. 9 to 6 ft.). Lips, mostly rather full and well-shaped, but sometimes thin, or upper lip very long (many Irish), and under lip pendulous (many Jews). Arms, rather short as compared with Negro. Legs, shapely, with calves usually well developed. Feet: 1 and 3 small with high instep; 2 rather large.
Mental Characters.
Temperament: 1 and 3. Brilliant, quick-witted, excitable and impulsive; sociable and courteous, but fickle, untrustworthy, and even treacherous (Iberian, South Italian); often atrociously cruel (many Slavs, Persians, Semites, Indonesians and even South Europeans); aesthetic sense highly, ethic slightly developed. All brave, imaginative, musical, and richly endowed intellectually. 2. Earnest, energetic, and enterprising; steadfast, solid, and stolid; outwardly reserved, thoughtful, and deeply religious; humane, firm, but not normally cruel.
Speech, mostly of the inflecting order with strong tendency towards analytical forms; very few stock languages (Aryan, Ibero-Hamito-Semitic), except in the Caucasus, where stock languages of highly agglutinating types are numerous, and in Indonesia, where one agglutinating stock language prevails.
Religion, mainly Monotheistic, with or without priesthood and sacrifice (Jewish, Christian, Muhammadan); polytheistic and animistic in parts of Caucasus, India, Indonesia, and Africa. Gross superstitions still prevalent in many places.
Culture, generally high—all arts, industries, science, philosophy and letters in a flourishing state now almost everywhere except in Africa and Indonesia, and still progressive. In some regions civilisation dates from an early period (Egypt, South Arabia, Babylonia; the Minoan, Hellenic, Hittite, and Italic cultures). Indonesians and many Hamites still rude, with primitive usages, few arts, no science or letters, and cannibalism prevalent in some places (Gallaland).
Main Divisions.