Men of the Old Stone Age: Their Environment, Life and ArtOsborn, Henry Fairfield
History
Men of the Old Stone Age: Their Environment, Life and Art
Osborn, Henry Fairfield
Art, Primitive; Prehistoric peoples; Stone age
The skull of the Krapina man (Fig. 93) is somewhat broader or more
brachycephalic than that of any other members of the Neanderthal race. In
general, the race is somewhat dwarfed, of broader head form and with less
prominent supraorbital processes. The species is unquestionably _Homo
neanderthalensis_, of which the Krapina men constitute a local race.
Schwalbe and Boule observe that the greater breadth of the Krapina skull
is partly due to the manner in which the bones have been put together,(44)
and they do not consider that the Krapina man represents a different
subrace (_Homo neanderthalensis krapinensis_) as held by the discoverer.
The cephalic index of one Krapina skull is recorded as 83.7 per cent (?)
as compared with 73.9 per cent, the cephalic index of the true _H.
neanderthalensis_, a difference which, as above noted, may be partly due
to the restoration. The bones are in such a fragmentary condition that it
is impossible to form a proper estimate of the brain capacity in either
the males or females of this race; nor is it possible to estimate the
stature. The space between the eyes is the same as in the Neanderthal
race; the angle of the retreat of the forehead (52°) is nearly the same as
in the Gibraltar female Neanderthal skull (50°), this high forehead being
due to the lesser development of the supraorbital ridges. That the brain
was of a low, flat-headed Neanderthal type is shown by the close
similarity of the index of the height of skull (42.2) to that of one of
the men of Spy (44.3), as compared with the lowest index among the
existing races of men (48.9); yet the Krapina man presents a considerable
advance over _Pithecanthropus_, in which the index of the height of skull
is only 34.2.
[Illustration: FIG. 93. Profile view, right side, of one of the skulls
from Krapina. This skull is much broader than that of the typical
Neanderthaloid. After Gorjanovič-Kramberger. One-quarter life size.]
The jaw is more slender than that of the Heidelberg man but is still thick
and massive; the chin is receding, a characteristic of all the Neanderthal
races.
The broken condition of all the human bones in this cavern, and the
abundant indications of fire, have led to the charge that the Neanderthals
of Krapina were cannibals, and that these mingled remains are the bones of
animals and men collected here during cannibalistic feasts. Against this
supposition Breuil observes that none of the human bones are split
lengthwise, as is the usual practice when extracting the marrow, but they
are broken crosswise. This is the only evidence of such practice that has
been found during all Palæolithic times, and we should hesitate to accept
it unless corroborated by other localities.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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