Acta Anthropologica Sinica ›› 2000, Vol. 19 ›› Issue (01): 32-90.

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Cranial features of bronze age human remains from Wayaogou, Shaanxi province

Chen Liang   

  • Online:2000-03-15 Published:2000-03-15

Abstract: The skull of bronze age studied in this paper were excav ted from Wayaogou tombs, Tongchuan city, Shaanxi province. The cranial material ( 6 males and 7 femles) are all adult ( aged 20— 35) . This article describes the mrphological features of Wayaogou crania in some details and discussed the problems concerned in the racial relationship between the Wayaogou craina and other modem and ancient ones of Asiatic Mongoloids.
The characteristics of the crania are as follows: the cranial shapes in norma verticalis belong to ovoid and ellipsoid. According to the cranial length-breadth index, cranial length- height index and cranial breadth-height index , their cranial forms belong to metriocrany, hypsicrany and acrocrany respectively. The cranial sutures are uncomplicated. The transition at the lower margin of zygomatic bone is roughly square in most of the crania. Their faces are wide ( 136. 33mm) and flat ( the naso-malar angle is 145. 10) . Their nasal bones are low and falt ( the simotic index is 25. 03) and the basal index shows that their nasal shapes belong to mesoorrhiny. The orbit is low and wide ( the orbital index I is 79. 87).
The physical feature of Wayaogou crania is mainly related to the modern Eastern Asiastic Mongoloids, but some physical elements of the southern Asiastic Mongoloids may be mixed. In comparison with ancient and modern crania, the Wayaogou crania are mostly similar to the crania of Group two o f Yinxu 's middle and small sized tombs, the group of Huoshaogou and the modern North China crania.

Key words: Human skull, Eastern Asiatic Mongoloid, Wayaogou, Bronze Age