present restoration. The thicknesses
which I decided to use may be said to
approximate the average for weU-
nourished but not fat individuals.
Copyright by J . H . McGregor
NEANDERTHAL AND CRO-MAGNON: A COMPARISON
Figs 5 and 7 represent front and profile views of the hairless phase of the head modeled on the Chapelle-
aux-Saints (Neanderthal) skull, and Figs. 6 and 8 show a head similarly constructed on a male skull of the
Cro-Mao-non race for comparison. The contrast facilitates recognition of the characteristic Neanderthal
features such as form and relative size of cranium and face, the heavy brow ridge, slope of forehead and
chin, wide but prominent nose and retreating cheeks
< '-So
^ > _ Z
P=H S S ?
,» c, £ "x
•- Z "5 = "=
Z 2 ;
Z z. — oa
-â– = Ma
RESTORING NEANDERTHAL MAN
293
It seemed advisable to a\t)i(l disguis-
ing the skull fonii by excessive flesh.
The local thicknesses adcjpted were
indicated in millimeters on photograpiis
of the skull, and kept as records, and a
great numljer of pins were driven into
the plaster skull at corresponding
points and cut off at proper heights,
and soundings of the depth of the
plasteline were made constantly
throughout the course of the work.
Finalh' the head without the hair was
cast. This model clearly shows the
racial head form, shape of nose, chin,
etc. (Contrast these features in the
hairless heads of Neanderthal and
Cro-Magnon men, Fig. 5-8.) It is
really more valuable scientifically than
the finished bust, in which the head
form is disguised by hair, and of course
we do not know the nature of the
Neanderthal hair. It will be noted
that the lips are not thick and everted
as in the Negro, as the vertically placed
incisor teeth with end-to-end bite
render such lips unUkely, and more-
over the negroid condition is almost
certainly not a primitive character,
but a racial specialization. After a
mold had been made of' this hairless
phase, the plasteline was removed
from the left half of the skull, leaving
the "flesh" on the right side, and a
cast of this ''half-and-half" model was
made. The double-exposure photo-
graphs or "phantoms" shown in Figs.
9 and 10 demonstrate the general
conformity of the restored soft tissues
to the underlying skull.
As a concession to popular taste,
the hair w^as modeled on a plaster cast
of the bald phase, and a slight sugges-
tion of beard added, though not suffi-
cient to disguise the form of the re-
treating chin, an important racial
feature. Finally, tliis finished bust
was cast in plaster, as a racial model
of an adull male Homo neanderihalen-
sis. (See page 288.)
The stages of this restoration can
be seen in the Museum: fir.st, the cast
of the skull before restoration; second,
the sam(> with the missing parts re-
stored; till 1(1 the "half-and-half" skull
and hairless head; and, finally, the
complete bust. In ncighboiing cases
Fig. 11 — The skulls of Neanderthal (Chapelle-auN-
Saints), A, and Cro-Magnon, B, ufter removal of
the plasteline. "A" and the hairless head (Figs. 5
and 7) were used in making the double exposures
shown in Figs. 9 and 10
may be seen casts of the remarkably
similar skulls of this same race from
Spy, Neanderthal, La Quina, and
Gibraltar, and fragments of others,
all of which were studied constantly
in connection with this work.
In every phase and feature of this
restoration I have tried to be conserva-
tive, to foUow only the guidance of
anatomical fact, minimizing my per-
sonal equation in the work as far as
possible, and avoiding any inclination
to make the result either bestial or
noble. But the Neanderthal species
was human, not brute, and though the
semblance of the former flesh which
clothes this ancient skull, is perforce
low-browed and heavy-featured — -it is
the Ukeness of a man.
Casts Obtained from the Brain Cases of
Fossil Men
By G. ELLIOT SMITH
Professor of Anatomy, University of London
THE interpretation of the brains
of extinct members of the human
family on the basis of the evi-
dence obtained by the casts of their
skulls is a comparatively new field of
research. In the first place, the material
for such studies has only recently
come into our possession, and, in the
second place, the problem of inter-
preting the significance of such data as
casts of brain cases afford, has only
been made possible of solution by the
development of our knowledge of the
brain within the last fifteen years. In
1865 anatomists were still disputing as
to the nature of the differences between
the brains of men and apes, and con-
troverting false assumptions that had
been made with reference to certain
characters claimed to have been dis-
tinctive either of the human or simian
brain. Hence when Huxley wrote
Man's Place in Nature he was not in a
position to discuss, except in the most
general way, the differences between
the human and the simian brain, or to
appreciate the features of the cast of
the only brain case of fossil man then
available, — that is the Neanderthal
skull. In 1898 Dr. Eugene Dubois
presented to the International Con-
gress of Zoologists at Cambridge a
report on the cast of the brain case of
Pithecanthropus, which perhaps can
be regarded as the true beginning of the
history of this type of investigation.
In that memoir Doctor Dubois con-
centrated attention upon the left
inferior frontal region of the cerebral
hemisphere in the attempt to discover
whether the brain revealed any features
to throw light upon the question of
speech. At that time it was commonly
supposed by physicians that the ability
to speak was entirely dependent upon
the integrity of the left inferior frontal
convolution, the so-called Broca's area:
but it is now realized that the acquisi-
tion of speech was an extremely com-
pHcated process dependent upon the
special development of a large series
of widely separated cortical areas in-
volving regions concerned with hearing,
sight; and touch, and the combination
of the three, as well as the more strictly
motor or executive portions of the
hemisphere. When the important
discovery of a representative of the
Neanderthal species was made at La
Chapelle-aux-Saints in 1908, Professor
Boule, in cooperation with Professor
Anthony, began the investigation of the
cast of its cranial cavity, and pubHshed
an important monograph (in L'Anthro-
pologie, Tome XXII, No. 2, 1911, page
50), which they further elaborated
during the next couple of years. The
announcement in 1912 of the discovery
of the Piltdown skull aroused consider-
able controversy as to the nature of
this hitherto unknown type of man, and
especially as to the question of the
possible co-relation between the skull
and the jaw found with it. This dis-
cussion was responsible for focusing
particular attention upon the brain as
one of the important factors in
determining whether or not the skull
was of so primitive a character as to be
associated with a jaw so suggestive of
simian affinities. The widest dis-
crepancies as to the shape and size of
294
CASTS OBTAINED FROM THE BRAIN CASES OF FOSSIL MEN 295
this eiulociaiiial cast lia\'i' \)vv\\ put
forward during the last thirteen years,
but there can now he no doubt what-
ever that the capacity of the brain
case is very definitely below the aver-
age of modern man, and in addition
that the cast of its interior reveals a
form of brain which is more primitive in
type than that of any known human
brain, except only that of Pithecan-
ihropus.
In approachino- the study of the cast
of the cranial cavity and attempting
from it to interpret the nature of the
brain that oi-iginally occupied a par-
ticular skull, oin- aims today are of a
different nature than those of our pre-
decessors. It is not so much the
attempt to identify certain definite
fissures and convolutions of the brain,
as to determine the relative state of
development of different functional
areas of the brain. During the last
twenty-five years it has been demon-
strated that the search which began a
century ago for certain features of the
brain distinctive either of man or ape
was a futile procedure because there
are no such distinctive characters.
No structure found in the brain of an
ape is lacldng in the human brain and,
on the other hand, the human brain
reveals no formation of any sort that
is not present in the brain of the gorilla
or the chimpanzee. So far as we can
judge at the present time, the only
distinctive feature of the human brain
is a quantitative one, namely a marked
increase in the extent of three areas in
the cerebral cortex, the parietal, the
pre-frontal, and the inferior temporal
which are relatively small in the brain
of the anthropoid apes and ver^^ much
more insignificant in the brain of all
other mammals. Hence the chief ob-
ject is to base our conclusions not so
much upon the absolute size of any
particular brain, as upon the relative
siz(> of those particular regions which
are of chief sigiiificarice in phyld-
genetics.
In a recent nuinlxT of this .louinal
Di'. James IT. McCJregor has given an
admirable account of the skull and
brain of I'/lhccd/illiriiiJiis. ;iiii| com-
pared it with the casts of the brain
cases of the giblxjn, the gorilla, tlie
Rhodesian skull, the Gibraltar skull,
and others. In his excellent restoration
of the complete foi-ni of the cast of
Pithecanthropus, which I tliink is as
accurate as the facts at present avail-
able warrant, he obtained a capacity
of 940 cubic centimeters, which, as he
pointed out, bridges the gap between the
580 for his gorilla and the 1.280 and
1,300 of other primitive men. The
outstanding distinctive feature of the
cast of this most primitive human brain
case is the extreme flatness, wliich is
due to the imperfect development of
the parietal and frontal regions. The
disproportionate and precocious over-
growth of the posterior part of the
temporal area must be regarded as the
tangible evidence of the sudden in-
crease of the importance of the acoustic
syml3olism, wliich can have no mean-
ing other than the inference that some
sort of speech had been acquired by
this most primitive and earliest known
member of the human family. The
widening of the brain in the posterior
temporal area gives the primitive brain
its most distinctive feature. The other
point of interest in this cast is the fact
that the marked as3'mmetry of the
brain, which is peculiar to the liuman
family, is already clearly defined;
but as I have pointed out elsewhere
(" Right and Left-handedness in Primi-
tive J\Ien," British Medical Journal,
December 12. 1925) the asymmetr}- is
of the Idnd which in modern man, and
296
NATURAL HISTORY
presumabh'- also in primitive man, is
associated with left-hancledness. Al-
though the three significant ai'eas of the
brain, the parietal, the frontal and the
temporal, are much larger than they
are in any ape, they are, on the other
hand, very definitely smaller than
those of any other known human brain.
A B
mentioned in Pithecanthropus, but
with a greater fulness of the three
significant areas.
The cast of Pithecanth-opus in its
general form is an anticipation of the
peculiar shape seen in a more fully
developed condition in the cast of the
Rhodesian skull and those of the
A' B' C
Fig. 1. — A and A', endocranial casts of male gorilla; B and B' Pithecanthro'pus, as
restored by Professor J. H. McGregor; and C and C, Rhodesian man, top and side views.
The three casts were photographed together to show the relative sizes. From J. H. McGregor
The cast that I have recently ob-
tained from the restoration of the Pilt-
down skull, in the completion of which
I received vahiable assistance from the
late Professor John I. Hunter and Dr.
John Beattie, reveals a cast which is
only about 1,170 cubic centimeters in
capacity. The distinctive features of
this cast are in the first place, the
localized hypertrophy of the posterior
temporal area, such as I have already
Neanderthal series. The Piltdown
cast, on the other hand, although it
reveals the flatness found in all
human brains, excepting only the
majority of members of the species
sapiens, displays a form, especially in
its posterior part, suggestive of the
condition found in Homo sapiens.
Both in Pithecanthropus and in Eoan-
thropus the deep broad notch found at
the posterior extremity of the orbital
CASTS OBTAINED FROM THE BRAIN CASES OF FOSSIL MEN 297
B
D
Fig. 2. — A, top view of endocranial cast of Pithecanthropus; B, Eoan-
thropus (Piltdown) restored; C, Neanderthal (La Chapelle-aux-Saints) ; and
D, Homo sapiens (white man), photographed together to show relative size
and form
margin suggests that the Sylvian
fissure was widely open at its anterior
end, as it is in the chimpanzee and the
gorilla.
^^^len we pass to the Rhodesian
east (Fig. 1, C, O) which is a Httle
bigger than that obtained from the
Pntdown skull, we find a brain that is
considerably altered in form, in the
direction which is familiar to us from
the series of Neanderthal casts. The
uneven expansion of the brain in this
process of development is more clearh'
displayed in this cast than in any other
human specimen, and for this reason
the Rhodesian cast is particularly
instructive. The prominence on the
posterior part of the temporal area is
still apparent, although this region as a
whole is still significantly small, a fact
that is most obtrusively displayed in
the lateral view. The pre-frontal area,
298
NATURAL HISTORY
D
Fig. 3. — A, left side view of endocranial cast of Pithecanthropus; B, Eoanthropus (Pilt-
down); C, Neanderthal (La Chapelle-aux-Saints) ; and D, Homo sapiens (white man), photo-
grajjhed together to show relative size and form. Pithecanthropus and Eoanthropus as
restored by Professor J. H. McGregor
also, although significantly larger than
that of the Piltdown cast, and of course
much larger still than in Pithecanthro-
pus, is still obviously ill-developed in
proportion to the general size of the
brain. It has an appearance as though
in a plastic state it had been taken in
the hand and squeezed into a smaller
compass. The openness of the Sylvian
fissure, to which I have already referred
in the case of Pithecanthropus and
Eoanthropus, is still manifest in the
Rhodesian cast, but in a less obtrusive
form. There is a much greater ap-
proach to the closure of this fissure
than there was in these more primitive
types. In the parietal area there is an
obvious expansion in comparison with
that of the Piltdown cast, an expan-
sion which affects mainly the inferior
part of the parietal area, yet in no
cranial cast is the defective develop-
ment of the upper and posterior part of
the parietal territorj^ more distincth'
demonstrated than in that of the
Rhodesian specimen. One of the inter-
esting features of the Rhodesian cast
(to which I have already called atten-
tion in the lecture reported in the
British Medical Journal) is the fact
that the lunate sulci are approximately
sjanmetrical on the two hemispheres ; a
condition that is found only very rarely
in modern human brains and then
specially in the Negro race.
When we come to the Neanderthal
CASTS OBTAINED FROM THE BRAIN CASES OF FOSSIL MEN 299
series of casts, one finds a state of
affairs that can be described as a
brain of Rhodesian type, in which the
great deficiencies found in that cast
have been partially filled up. The
brain in all members of this species is
still exceptionally fiat, with the occipi-
tal end pulled out in a very distinctive
way. The pre-frontal area is still
small, both relatively and actually, but
is not so obtrusively diminutive as it is
in the Rhodesian and the more primi-
tive human casts. Nor does one find
that irregularity of the contour of the
parietal area which is so striking a
feature of the Rhodesian cast. At the
same time the parietal area in some of
them, especially the La Quina and
Gibraltar specimens is not nearly so
full as it is in Homo sapiens, even in
quite primitive representatives of that
species Hke the aboriginal AustraKan.
Hence in some of the Neanderthal
casts, especially that of the La Quina
specimen, the locahzed sweUing of the
posterior part of the temporal region,
already noticed in the three more primi-
tive members of the family, is still
quite a recognizable feature. In the
posterior extremity of the hemisphere
one can detect the same sort of asym-
metry found in Homo sapiens, although
perhaps in a less obtrusive form. The
great size obtained in certain of the
Neanderthal series seems to be due to
an increase in the extent of the primarj^
sensory areas and of the parietal
territory. There is no significant in-
crease in the sizes of the pre-frontal and
inferior temporal areas.
TMien we come to Homo sapiens the
most significant change is the altera-
tion in the contour of the brain; an
increase in height and a diminution in
breatltli of tlic brain. Both diameters,
however, share in the secondary ex-
jiansion that occurs later on in the
higher types of brain so as to produce
the high-domed and well-filled brain,
which is so distinctive of modern man.
Perhaps the most distinctive feature of
the brain of Homo sapiens is the signi-
ficant increase in the size of the pre-
frontal territory, which becomes con-
siderably bigger than it is in any other
species of the human family. This
leads to the filHng out of the fore-head
and confers upon modern man a cUstinc-
tive type of brow which distinguishes
him from all other members of the
family. In spite of the enormous range
of variations in the size and form of the
brain of Homo sapiens, it never loses
this distinctive feature. Although the
brains of individual members of the
species may be smaller than that of
any of the known extinct types, not
excluding even Pithecanthropus, the
brain always differs in form from these
types, and the reduction in size may
affect other areas than those of the
three significant regions that I have
mentioned. Hence a very small brain
in modern man presents a profound
contrast in shape and relative size of
areas to the brain of corresponding size in
extinct members of the human family.
With the increase of our knowledge
of the structure and functions of the
cerebral cortex, it is now becoming
possible to correlate in some measure
the facts of cerebral anatomy in early
forms of the human family vAih. the
developing powers of manual dex-
terity and abihty to learn from experi-
mentation, upon which man's growdng
understanding of the world in which he
lives ultimately depends.
The Crown Patterns of Fossil and Recent
Human Molar Teeth and Their Meaning
By WILLIAM K. GREGORY^ AND MILO HELLMAN^
THE crown of a second lower molar
(m2 Fig. lA) of a white person is
very apt to comprise four main
elevations or cusps, grouped in two
transverse pairs. Two of these cusps,
which we will designate by the odd
numbers 1, 3, are on the outer or cheek
side, and the other two (2, 4) on the
inner or tongue side. The outer cusps
are more or less flattened, conical,
the inner ones when unworn bear low
cross crests. These four cusps are
separated at their bases by two promi-
nent grooves that cross each other
almost at right angles near the middle
of the crown: the longitudinal groove
starts in front between cusps 1 and 2
and ends behind between cusps 3 and
4; the transverse groove begins weU
down on the outer side between cusps 1
and 3 and ends on the inner border
between cusps 2 and 4. If these
grooves were perfectly straight and
completely at right angles to each other,
all four of the main cusps would be in
equal contact at the crossing place on
the middle of the crown. But fre-
quently cusps 1 and 4 crowd their
neighbors a Httle and, gaining a small
contact with each other, they prevent
cusp 3 from being in contact with cusp
2. This whole arrangement of four
cusps and two main grooves with the
1-4 contact has been called the "cruci-
form" or "plus-shaped" pattern of the
lower molars.
In the first lower molar (mi Fig.
IB) of all human races a fifth main cusp
(5) is usually present behind 3 and
nearer the midline of the crown. In
this five-cusped type the simple plus-
shaped pattern is replaced by a more
complex arrangement, the most con-
spicuous feature being a more or less
irregular Y, the stem of which is the
inner transverse groove between cusps
2 and 4, the fork being formed by the
outer half of the transverse groove
(between cusps 1 and 3) and by the deep
obUque furrow between cusps 3 and 5.
There is no 1-4 contact but there is a
prominent 2-3 contact. Near the front
border of the crown between cusps 1
and 2 there is frequently a prominent
transverse groove or crack which has
been called the "fovea anterior" (f.a.),
while on the hinder inner border,
between cusps 5 and 4, a smaller
fissure is called the "fovea posterior"
(Fig. 10, f.p.). This whole pattern of
five main cusps, with the longitudinal
and Y-shaped grooves, the 3-2 con-
tact, the fovese anterior and posterior,
in 1916 was named by one of us the
" Dryopithecus pattern" of the lower
molars, for reasons that will appear
later.
While there is a great variation both
in the sizes and in the patterns of aU
the molars in modern races, the first
molar is apt to be larger than the
second, and it almost always tends to
have five cusps and preserves more or
less clearly the " Dryopithecus pattern"
(Fig. 2). The second molar, especially
in the white race (Fig. lA) is apt to
have only 4 cusps and the "plus pat-
tern." The third molar, which is
iProfessor of Vertebrate Palaeontology, Columbia University, and Curator of Comparative and Human
Anatomy, American Museum
^Research Associate in Physical Anthropology, American Museum.
300
CROWN PATTERiYS OF FOSSIL AND HUMAN MOLAR TEETH 301
Fig.l. — Human lower teeth, left side, sho"n"ing arrangement of cusps in molars.
A, TMiite; B, C, Indian. Compare the arrangement of the cusps in the
anthropoids (Fig. 2).
delaj'ed in its eruption in the white
race (Fig. lA, ms), is often smaller than
mi and more or less irregular in out-
line, usually with a 1—1 contact and
irregular plus pattern. In Negroes
the third lower molar usually erupts
somewhat earlier in life; it is larger
than in the whites and frequently
retains five cusps and clearer traces of
the " Dryopithecus pattern." With
minor differences much the same con-
ditions prevail in Austrahan aboriginals.
On all three molars of some races,
such as Xegroes. Austrahan aboriginals
and Indians, a sLxth cusp (Fig. 3D, 6)
often appears on the middle of the
302
NATURAL HISTORY
TTL.S.
Ta.2.
nx.i.
Fig. 2.— Left Lower
Molar Teeth of Fossil
AND Recent Anthropoids.
Drawing by M a r c e 1 1 e
Roigneau.
F, Recent gorilla, Africa.
E, Recent chimpanzee, Africa
D, Recent orang-utan, Asia.
C, Dryopithecus frickse, Mio-
cene India.
B, Di'yopithecus cautleyi from
the Miocene of India.
A, Dryopithecus fontani from
the Miocene of France and
Spain.
hinder border and lying either between
cusps 5 and 4 or in m2 between 3 and 4.
In the later post-glacial races of
prehistoric men (Neolithic) the lower
molar teeth, while well developed, do
not differ conspicuously from those of
recent races, but in the older races
from the Upper, Middle and Lower
Pleistocene of Europe (Cro-Magnon,
Grimaldi, Mousterian, Ehringsdorf,
Heidelberg, Piltdown) the lower molars
vary from a modernized condition in
Cro-Magnon to a decidedly ape-like
stage in Piltdown (Fig. 6). The lower
molars of the Javan Pithecanthropus
are unknown, but to judge from the
curious mixture of human and orang-
like details in its upper molars,^ the
lower molars should also have been
more or less ape-Hke.
The very ancient Heidelberg jaw
'The evidence for this statement is given in Amer.
Mus. Bulletin, Vol. XL VIII, pp. 527-530. 1923.
"Further Notes on the Molars of Hesperopithecufs and
of Pithecanthropus," by William K. Gregory and Milo
Hellman.
CROWN PATTERNS OF FOSSIL AND HUMAN MOLAR TEETH 303
m.S. Tn..2. TTl.! Fig. 3.— Left Lower Molar
Teeth of Fossil ane Recent
Men.
Di-Mwing by Marcelle Roigneau
r F. White.
E. Hindu, India.
D, Australian aboriginal.
from the First Interglacial stage of the
Pleistocene epoch, in respect to its
retreating chin and extremely wide
ascending branch may fairly be termed