Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1889-04-30
HEAT AND SKULLS,
It Is Now Supposed That the Sun VIII
Harden the Human Uranium. -.

It Il Now Supposed That the Sun VIII
Harden the Human Uranium. -.
One of the most interesting things men,
toned by Prof. Virchow in his little book
just published, entitled Medical Remem-
brances Of an Egyptian Journey" in which
he describes an excursion up the Nile as far
as the first cataract, is that the broken
skulls on the first great sepulchral fields,
dating from Roman times are as thick and
hard as Herodotus says those of the slain
Egyptians were in comparison with the
brittle ones Of the Persians. The GreeK
historian explains this by attributing it to
the early exposure of children to the heat
of the sun; and in many parts of Upper
Egypt the German travellers actually found
young children thus exposed during their
parents absence in the fields in immense
clay bowls, resembling in shape a cham
pagne glass without a stem, into which they
were put without shelter. This discovery
by Prof. Virchow is interesting, says the
American Analyst, because it at once sug-
gests the question whether the proverbial
thickness of the skull of the negro has not
been caused by exposure to the sun, and
whether it is a popularity of savages of
tropical countries that their skulls are
thicker and harder than those of the inhab-
itants of temperate and colder countries.
any investigation to ascertain whether the
skulls of different races vary in degrees of
hardness. 1t would be almost impossible to
make such an inquiry. As is well known,
the human skull increases in hardness from
childhood to maturity and age. A miscel-
laneous collection of skulls of any given
people would therefore be of no value in
such an investigation. To obtain
collection of skulls of number Of nationali-
ties, that should be taken from subjects all
of the same age, to have them all similarly
prepared and in sufficient numbers to make
it possible to draw any general conclusions
from their comparison with each other,
would be manifestly impossible. More at
tention has been given to the relative thick
ness of different skulls, or rather to their
weight, from which their thickness may be
inferred OF the large collection of crania
in the Army Medical Museum at Washing
ton the thickest are those of negroes and
Alaskan Indians. The skulls of other In
dians, both of North and South America,
in tropical or temperate climes, and of the
Eskimau, do not appear to be particularly
thick. Among the ancient Peruvian skulls
recently received by the museum, and the
ancient crania collected in Arizona, there
are frequent individual variations in thick |
ness, but no tendency to unusual thickness
The conclusion from these facts is that ex
posure to the sun probably does not cause
thickness of the human skull In con-
necton with this subject, it is interesting
to note that among the Australians the
sinus frontalis Is generally found to be solid
in the males, instead of being hollow, as in
the skulls of other races. This bone in the
male Australians generally extends straight
across the head, the lower side overhang-
ing the eyes so that they seem to look out
from under it, while in the North American
indians a modification of shape deprives
them of that heavy look about the forehead.
The heavy sinus trontalts of the Australians,
of course, increases the weight of the skull.