The History of Creation, Vol. 2 (of 2) / Or the Development of the Earth and its Inhabitants by the Action of Natural Causes

by Ernst Haeckel

While we hold the latter of these convictions, and while we for many reasons believe that the different species of speechless primæval men were all derived from a common ape-like human form, we do not of course mean to say that all men are descended from one pair. This latter supposition, which our modern Indo-Germanic culture has taken from the Semitic myth of the Mosaic history of creation, is by no means tenable. The whole of the celebrated dispute, as to whether the human race is descended from a single pair or not, rests upon a completely false way of putting the question. It is just as senseless as the dispute as to whether all sporting dogs or all race-horses are descended from a single pair. We might with equal justice ask whether all Germans or all Englishmen are “descended from a single pair,” etc. A “first human pair,” or “a first man,” has in fact never existed, any more than there ever existed a first pair or a first individual of Englishmen, Germans, race-horses, or sporting dogs. The origin of a new species, of course, always results from an existing species, by a long chain of many different individuals sharing the slow process of transformation. Supposing that we had all the different pairs of Human Apes and Ape-like Men before us—which belong to the true ancestors of the human race—it would even then be quite impossible (without doing so most arbitrarily) to call any one of these pairs of ape-like men “the first pair.” As little can we derive each of the twelve races or species of men, which we shall consider directly, from a “first pair.”

The difficulties met with in classifying the different races or species of men are quite the same as those which we discover in classifying animal and vegetable species. In both cases forms apparently quite different are connected with one another by a chain of intermediate forms of transition. In both cases the dispute as to what is a kind or a species, what a race or a variety, can never be determined. Since Blumenbach’s time, as is well known, it has been thought that mankind may be divided into five races or varieties, namely: (1) the Ethiopian, or black race (African negro); (2) the Malayan, or brown race (Malays, Polynesians, and Australians); (3) the Mongolian, or yellow race (the principal inhabitants of Asia and the Esquimaux of North America); (4) the Americans, or red race (the aborigines of America); and (5) the Caucasian, or white race (Europeans, north Africans, and south-western Asiatics). All of these five races of men, according to the Jewish legend of creation, are said to have been descended from “a single pair”—Adam and Eve,—and in accordance with this are said to be varieties of one kind or species. If, however, we compare them without prejudice, there can be no doubt that the differences of these five races are as great and even greater than the “specific differences” by which zoologists and botanists distinguish recognised “good” animal and vegetable species (“bonæ species”). The excellent palæontologist Quenstedt is right in maintaining that, “if Negroes and Caucasians were snails, zoologists would universally agree that they represented two very excellent species, which could never have originated from one pair by gradual divergence.”

The characteristics by which the races of men are gradually distinguished are partly taken from the formation of the hair, partly from the colour of the skin, and partly from the formation of the skull. In regard to the last character, two extremes are distinguished, namely, long heads and short heads. In long-headed men (Dolichocephali), whose strongest development is found in Negroes and Australians, the skull is extended, narrow, and compressed on the right and left. In short-headed men (Brachycephali), on the other hand, the skull is compressed in an exactly opposite manner, from the front to the back, is short and broad, which is especially striking in the case of the Mongolians. Medium-headed men (Mesocephali), standing between the two extremes, predominate especially among Americans. In every one of these three groups we find men with slanting teeth (Prognathi), whose jaws, like those of the animal snout, strongly project, and whose front teeth therefore slope in front, and men with straight teeth (Orthognathi), whose jaws project but little, and whose front teeth stand perpendicularly. During the last ten years a great deal of time and trouble have been devoted to the careful examination and measurement of the forms of skulls, which have, however, not been rewarded by corresponding results. For within a single species, as for example within the Mediterranean species, the form of the skull may vary so much that both extremes are met with in the same species. Much better starting-points for the classification of of the human species are furnished by the nature of the hair and speech, because they are much more strictly hereditary than the form of the skull.

Comparative philology seems especially to be becoming an authority in this matter. In the latest great work on the races of men, which Friederich Müller has published in his excellent “Ethnography,”[(42)] he justly places language in the fore-ground. Next to it the nature of the hair of the head is of great importance; for although it is in itself of course only a subordinate morphological character, yet it seems to be strictly transmitted within the race. Of the twelve species of men distinguished on the following table (p. [308]), the four lower species are characterised by the woolly nature of the hair of their heads; every hair is flattened like a tape, and thus its section is oval. These four species of woolly-haired men (Ulotrichi) we may reduce into two groups—tuft-haired and fleecy-haired. The hair on the head of tuft-haired men (Lophocomi), Papuans and Hottentots, grows in unequally divided small tufts. The woolly hair of fleecy-haired men (Eriocomi), on the other hand, in Caffres and Negroes, grows equally all over the skin of the head. All Ulotrichi, or woolly-haired men, have slanting teeth and long heads, and the colour of their skin, hair, and eyes is always very dark. All are inhabitants of the Southern Hemisphere; it is only in Africa that they come north of the equator. They are on the whole at a much lower stage of development, and more like apes, than most of the Lissotrichi, or straight-haired men. The Ulotrichi are incapable of a true inner culture and of a higher mental development, even under the favourable conditions of adaptation now offered to them in the United States of North America. No woolly-haired nation has ever had an important “history.”

SYSTEMATIC SURVEY
Of the 12 Species of Men and their 36 Races.
(Compare Plate [XV].)
Species.		Races.				Home.	Immigrated from the
	1. Papuan Homo Papua		1.	Nigritos		Malacca, Philippine Islands	West
			2.	New Guinea men		New Guinea	West
			3.	Melanesians		Melanesia	North-west
			4.	Tasmanians		Van Diemen’s Land	North-west
	2. Hottentot Homo Hottentottus		5.	Hottentots		The Cape	North-east
			6.	Bushmen		The Cape	North-east
	3. Kaffre Homo Cafer		7.	Zulu Kaffres		Eastern South Africa	North
			8.	Beschuanas		Central South Africa	North-east
			9.	Congo Kaffres		Western South Africa	East
	4. Negro Homo Niger
			10.	Tibu negroes		Tibu district	South-east
			11.	Soudan negroes		Soudan	East
			12.	Senegambians		Senegambia	East
			13.	Nigritians		Nigritia	East
	5. Australian H. Australis		14.	North Australians		North Australia	North
			15.	South Australians		South Australia	North
	6. Malay Homo Malayus		16.	Sundanesians		Sunda Archipelago	West
			17.	Polynesians		Pacific Archipelago	North
			18.	Natives of Madagascar		Madagascar	East
	7. Mongolian Homo Mongolus		19.	Indo-Chinese		Tibet, China	South
			20.	Coreo-Japanese		Corea, Japan	South-west
			21.	Altaians		Central Asia, North Asia	South
			22.	Uralians		North-western Asia, Northern Europe, Hungary	South-east
	8. Arctic Men Homo Arcticus		23.	Hyperboreans		Extreme N.E. of Asia	South-west
			24.	Esquimau		The extreme north of America	West
	9. American Homo Americanus		25.	North Americans		North America	North-west
			26.	Central Americans		Central America	North
			27.	South Americans		South America	North
			28.	Patagonians		The extreme south of South America	North
	10. Dravidas Homo Dravida		29.	Deccans		Hindostan	East?
			30.	Singalese		Ceylon	North?
	11. Nubian Homo Nuba		31.	Dongolese		Nubia	East
			32.	Fulatians		Fulu-land (Central Africa)	East
	12. Mediterranese Homo Mediterraneus		33.	Caucasians		Caucasus	South-east
			34.	Basque		Extreme north of Spain	South?
			35.	Semites		Arabia, North Africa, etc.	East
			36.	Indo-germanic tribes		South-western Asia, Europe, etc.	South-east

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PEDIGREE OF TWELVE SPECIES OF MEN

								Indo-Germanians
9. Americans						Semites		│
│				Magyars		│		│	Caucasians
│	Esquimaux			│		│	Basques	│	│
│ │	│ │			Fins		│ │	│ │	│ │	│ │
│	│			│		│	│	│	│
│ │ │ │	Hyperboreans 8.Arctic Men			│ │ │ │	Samoides	│ │ │		│ │ │
│ │	│ │		Tartars	│ │	│ │	│ │		│ │
			│ │	│ │	│ │	12. Mediterranese
│	Tungusians	Calmucks	│	│	│	Singalese	│		Fulatians
│	│	│	│	│	│	│	│		│
Altaians				Uralians		Deccans 10. Dravidas	│ │		Dongolese 11. Nubians
	│			│		│	│		│
Japanese		Ural-Altaians				Euplocomi
│				│			│
│				│			│
│	Chinese	Tibet	Siamese	│	Polynesians	Madagascars	│	3. Kaffres	4. Negroes
│	│	│	│	│	│	│	│	│	│
Coreo-Japanese	Indo-Chinese			│ │	Sundanesians		│ │	Eriocomi
│	│			│	│		│	│
7. Mongols					Malays		│ │	│ │
│					│		│	│
								│
		Promalays				2. Hottentots		│ │ │
		│ │ │			1. Papuans	│ │ │		│ │ │
		│		5. Australians	│	│		│
		│		│	│	│		│
		Euthycomi			Lophocomi			│ │
		│			│			│
		Straight-haired Lissotrichi			Woolly-haired Ulotrichi
		│			│
	Primæval Men