The natives of Kharga Oasis, Egypt / by Ales̆ Hrdlic̆ka.

  • Alex Hrdlicka
Date:
[1912]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The natives of Kharga Oasis, Egypt / by Ales̆ Hrdlic̆ka. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    115/167 (page 103)
    Those who are not mixed with the blacks, show a fairly uniform physical type. This type is characterized by medium brown skin, horizontal brown eye, black and straight hair (with a tendency to wave when longer), black, straight, wavy or slightly curly and often scanty beard, moderate stature, dolicho- to mesocephalic and medium high head, oblong and meso- to orthognathic face, mesorhinic nose, rather long and narrow ear, and moderately proportioned chest, pelvis, hands and feet. They give somewhat higher pulse and respiration than the average in whites, but perceptibly lower tem- perature, and decidedly lower muscular force. The type of the Kharga natives is radically distinct from that of the negro. It is according to all indications fundamentally the same as that of the non-negroid Valley Egyptians. It is in all probability a composite of closely related northeastern African and southwestern Asiatic, or “ hamitic ” and “ Semitic ” ethnic elements, and is to be classed with these as part of the southern extension of the Mediter- ranean subdivision of the white race. Judging from the mummies of the Oasis inhabitants from the 2-5 centuries A. D., exhumed at El Baguat, the type of the present non-negroid Kharga natives is substantially the same as that of the population of the Oasis during the first part of the Christian era. The nature of the population of the Oasis in more ancient times can only be determined by skeletal material from the ancient cemeteries. In order to facilitate the general use or more extended analysis of the data, the detailed measurements are appended. There is also added a bibliography relating or referring to the Kharga Oasis population.