THE RACES OF EUROPE

At the same time, they resemble modern Alpines in vault size, while the faces are narrower. The bloc of early brachycephals of western Europe and North Africa which includes Afalou, Ofnet, and the Borreby skulls is quite different, being much larger in vault size and in facial dimensions as well. The Cypriotes notably lack the heavy mandible of western Euro­pean brachycephals.

The position of the Cypriotes in the modern racial scheme falls into the brachycephalic group of moderate vault size, including Alpines, Arme- noids, and Dinarics; the most notable feature is the small face, notable for its narrowness, and the light jaw. It is more like the modern Dinarics than anything else, since it diverges from the Armenian standard in the same way as do modern Albanians. The stature ¹² was tall, as with modern Dinarics, and the long bones slender. The brachycephalic people who entered the Anatolian—Eastern Mediterranean region in the latter part of the third millennium B.C. were, therefore, ap early form of Dinaric; as, one suspects, were the so-called “Armenoids” who came into Mesopo­tamia at the same time. This is our first meeting with the Dinaric race. Its appearance in western Asia seems quite abrupt, but was probably the re­sult of a gradual development, followed by an overflow or evacuation from the seat of its characterization. Where this may have been is still unknown.

Nevertheless, we may eliminate a number of possibilities. It did not come from Egypt or Mesopotamia, and it could not have come from the northern steppes, which were occupied by dolichocephals. Its place of origin was probably not far from Cyprus. Despite the Anatolian evidence, it may have developed somewhere in the highlands of Asia Minor or in the mountains of Syria, for it is especially numerous in both these places today.

It could not, presumably, have been an unreduced and unmixed Upper Palaeolithic survival. It lacks the size of vault, the width of face, and the lowness of orbit which characterize all groups so derived. In face and nose form and in size, it resembles the common Mediterranean types of Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, and the Irano-Afghan plateau. It may, therefore, have been a local and specialized Near Eastern form, brachycephalized by some agency and mechanism which will be explained later.¹³ From its point of dispersal at the eastern end of the Mediterranean, it spread by sea into far distant lands.

3. The minoans

The earliest land to receive metal which is considered part of Europe was Crete, and there the Bronze Age Minoan civilization began a century

¹⁸ Mean for 13 males =168 cm.

13. The biological status and origin of the Dinaric race will be explained in the chap­ters on the living, particularly in Chapter VIII, Section 6, and Chapter XII, Sec­tions 11, 12, and 17.

141

or two before 3000 B.C. Crete had been occupied in earlier times by Neo- lithic peoples, of whom unfortunately no physical traces remain. The Metal Age was introduced by immigrants from two directions—from the Egyptian Delta, about the time that Menes was extending his power north­ward, and from the mainland of Asia, presumably from Palestine. The Cretan manner of metal-working was largely of Asiatic rather than of Egyptian inspiration.¹⁴

Although Neolithic remains are absent, the Minoan Age is represented by one hundred and more skulls, and a smaller number of long bones,¹⁵ as well as a considerable body of very realistic fresco painting and sculpture in the round.

The Cretan skulls found at various sites on the island belong to a fairly uniform type; this is a small Mediterranean variety with a mean cranial index of about 72. Metrically, they could fit perfectly into a number of Egyptian collections, from the Naqada predynastic to the Middle Empire. On the whole, these Cretan crania are a little smaller, shorter-faced, and less leptorrhine than the majority of the Egyptian series, and show leanings in the direction of the Copper Age skulls from Alishar, and the Early Bronze Age ones from Palestine. The mean type was somewhere between Danubian, Cappadocian, and Egyptian forms.

That this was a short-statured variety of Mediterranean race is shown by the long bones; local means vary from 156 to 162 cm. Hence, the Cretans were shorter than the Egyptians as well as lower faced. The bodily build of the Cretans is well known from fresco painting and sculpture; the local ideal of a small waist and wiry, light, but vigorous musculature, which occurs so constantly in the Minoan art, must have been based to a large extent on reality. Nevertheless, there was a variant minority with broad bodies, and, in the women, large breasts;¹⁶ this departure from the usual Mediterranean form was also seen in Egypt, and does not necessarily imply the presence of an alien race.

The Minoans were prevailingly brunet in hair and eye color, but in Late Minoan times, at least, blondism was known, but apparently not com­mon.¹⁷ The skin is represented by Minoan painters as a deep terra cotta for men, and white for women. This exaggerates the difference between outdoor and indoor habits of life. It again reflects Egyptian influence. The

13. Childe, V. G., The Bronze Age, pp. 19-20.

¹⁶ Evans, Sir A., Palace of Minos at Knossus, vol. 1, pp. 7-13.

Duckworth, W. L. H., ARBS, vol. 9, 1902-03, pp. 344-355.

Hawes, G. H., and H. B., Crete, the Forerunner of Greece, pp. 23-26.

Luschan, E. von, ZFE, vol. 45, 1913, pp. 307-393.

Rosinski, B., Kosmos, vol. 50, 1925, pp. 584-637.

Sergi, G., AJA, second ser., vol. 5, 1901, pp. 315-318.

16. Myres, J. L., Who Were The Greeks? pp. 74-76.

17. Myres, J. L., op. cit._f pp. 198-199.