Abstract: Five hundred and eighty-eight Yao people including 349 males and 239 females were investigated at Jianghua Autonomous County, Hunan. Some of the major significant items are summarized as follows:
1. The statures of the Yao people of Jianghua are rather short, averaging 159.59 cm for males and 149.42 for females respectively.
2. The indices of stature-armstretch atel03.90 for males and 102.75 for females. The average readings of their armstretch are larger than those of their statures.
3. The head forms are grouped under the mesocephalic type (approching the brachycephalic type) and the hypsicephalic type, according to their length-breadth indices (male: 80.34, female: 80.45) and their length-auricular height indices (male: 68.51, female: 67.53) respectively. According to their breadth-auricular height the niales (85.46) are grouped under the acrocephalic type and the females (84.20) are grouped under the metricepha- lic type, but approching the acrocephalic type.
4. Their facial forms are grouped under the leptoprosopic type, according： to their morphological facial indices (88.95 for males and 88.35 for females).
5. The Mongoloid fold is fairly common. The of appearance totals up to 66.9 percent.
6. Fold of the upper palpebra is very common. Its rate of appearance totals up to 88.6 percent.
All these items have been compared with those of the Han people living in Jianghua whether as natives or as imigrants from nearby counties. And, in addition, some of these items have been compared with those of the Lis of Hainan Island, the Mongols of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and the Orochees of Heilongjiang.
According to these analyses and comparisons, the Yao nationality can be regareded as belong to South China type.

Key words: Anthropometry; the Yao nationality of Jianghua