On the problem of craniological differentiation in two species of the green monkeys: Chlorocebus pygerythrus and C. aethiops (Cercopithecidae, Primates)

The problem of taxonomic differentiation in the order Primates is one of the important problems of evolutionary anthropology and primatology. The systematics of primates reflects their evolutionary relationships and allows to reconstruct the possible ways of formation of particular groups. Clarification of primate taxonomy involves a wide range of data, primarily from the field of morphology. Among the morphological features that distinguish particular taxa, the special role belongs to the system of craniological characters, which allow diagnosing the skulls in museum collections or fossil materials. The article is devoted to craniological identification of two species of the genus Chlorocebus: Chlorocebus pygerythrus (vervets) and Chlorocebus aethiops (grivets).

I.—Craniological Observations on the Lengths, Breadths, and Heights of a Hundred Australian Aboriginal Crania

The present work forms the first portion of an investigation into the craniological characters of the Australian aboriginal crania at present being conducted by the author, and is part of a general scheme for the osteological investigation of the Australian aboriginal initiated by the Professor of Anatomy in the University of Melbourne.There are, as is well known, two methods of treating craniometric statistics, and which, for convenience, may be designated (1) The Empirical Method; (2) The Rational Method.The object aimed at in both is to find numbers that shall be characteristic of the race of any country.“The Empirical method places very little value on the length and breadth of a skull except as a means of arriving at their ratio—the cephalic index—‘the subdivisions of which,’ says Gray (15), ‘are all arbitrary.’ Some, e.g. Retzius, made use of centres; others, e.g. Welcker, made use of limits, and there appears to be no special reason for fixing the limits of the groups at one index more than another. The analysis of craniometrical statistics by this method becomes comparatively simple: calculate the cephalic index and other indices for each individual, and find the average or mean index for the whole group of people measured. The highest and lowest index is usually stated as indicating the range of variation on each side of the mean. As the range of variation of the cephalic index is usually quite as great as the range of variation of the absolute dimensions, it is difficult to understand the belief in the value of indices of the Empirical school.”

XXVIII.—Contributions to the Craniology of the People of the Empire of India. Part I. The Hill Tribes of the North-East Frontier and the People of Burma

For a number of years I have been collecting specimens and conducting an investigation into the craniological characters of the native inhabitants of our great Indian Empire, and several hundred skulls have now been under examination, and almost all have been measured. The sources to which I have been indebted for material are in part the collection of crania belonging to the Henderson Trustees, long known as the Edinburgh Phrenological Museum, and now deposited by the Trustees in the Anatomical Museum of the University; in part, a few specimens belonging to the University collected by my predecessors in office; in part, the valuable series of Indian crania belonging to the Indian Museum, Calcutta, which through the intercession of Dr John Anderson, F.R.S., the former Director, the Trustees of that Museum, with great liberality, most courteously permitted me to have the loan of for purposes of study; and lastly, a number of crania which have been forwarded to me by friends and former pupils, engaged in the public service in India, to whom I take this opportunity of expressing my indebtedness for the valuable material which I have received from them.