The skeletal parts of the western Eskimo, outside of the skull, are but little known. The only records are those on two skeletons (one male, one female) from Point Barrow by Hawkes,[188] and those on a few bones from Port Clarence by Cameron.[189] The data on the skeletal parts of the northern and eastern Eskimo are only slightly richer, being for the most part fragmentary and scattered.[190] Nor has the time arrived yet for a comprehensive study of such material, for notwithstanding the relative abundance in crania and the more resistant individual skeletal parts, the securing of anywhere near complete skeletons is very difficult. Nevertheless there is now a good number of the long bones of the western Eskimo in the possession of the National Museum and the main data on these, all secured personally by the writer, will be given. They must for the present remain essentially as so many figures without adequate discussion and comparisons. Nevertheless a few facts appear so plainly that they may well be pointed out before concluding this section.

Western Eskimo: the Long Bones

The first fact shown by the preceding figures is the slightly greater length of all the long bones in the midwestern and northwestern groups as compared with those of the Bering Sea (midwestern and southwestern). This means naturally that the people of the Seward Peninsula and northward average somewhat taller in stature.

The second evident fact is that the people of the Seward Peninsula and the more northern groups (so far as represented in these collections) show a slightly greater stature of all the bones than the groups farther south, showing that they were both a somewhat taller and somewhat sturdier people.

The next fact of importance is the remarkable agreement in some respects in the relative proportions of the main skeletal parts between the people of the more southern and the more northern groups. The males are more regular in this respect than the females. The relative proportions of the humerus and again the tibia at their middle are identical in the males of the southwestern and midwestern groups and those farther northward; and the radio-humeral, humero-femoral, and tibio-femoral indices are all very closely related. Why there should be less agreement in these respects among the females it is difficult to say; in all probability the series of specimens are not sufficiently large.

The next table presents data and some racial comparisons. Here the western Eskimo are taken as a unit. They are seen to considerably resemble the Yukon Indians, but somewhat less so other Indians in the radio-humeral and tibio-femoral indices, and they resemble all the Indians in the relative proportions of the femur at its middle. In other respects there are somewhat more marked differences, especially between the western Eskimo and the Indians in general. Some irregularities in the Yukon series may be due to insufficiency of numbers.

When compared with the bones of the whites and the negroes the Eskimo and Indians separate themselves in many respects as a distinct group, while the white and the negro bones are particularly distinct through the greater relative thickness of the humerus and tibia at their middle, and of the femur at its upper flattening; in other words the Eskimo as well as the Indians are more platybrachic, platymeric and platycnemic than the whites or the negroes.

The basic relation of the Eskimo to the Indian bones is quite evident; though the Eskimo, when compared to Indians outside of Alaska, show a relatively shorter radius and tibia, indicating the already discussed relative shortness of the forearm and leg.

Western Eskimo, Long Bones: Comparative Data

Long Bones in Eskimo and Stature

One of the most desirable of possibilities in the anthropometry of any people, but particularly in groups now extinct, is a correct estimation of their stature. For this purpose the most useful aid has been found in the long bones, and various essays have been made by Manouvrier, Rollet, Topinard, Pearson, and others[198] at preparing tables or arriving at methods that would enable the student to promptly and satisfactorily obtain the stature as it was in life from the length of the long bones. But all these essays were based on observations on white people, and it has always been recognized that they could not with equal confidence be applied to other racial groups. They would in all probability be especially inapplicable to the Eskimo with his relatively short forearms and legs; yet the possibility of estimating the stature in many localities of the Eskimo territory, where no living remain, would be of real value. Fortunately for this purpose there are now some data on hand which make this possible.

In 1910, in my Contributions to the Anthropology of the Central and Smith Sound Eskimo, I was able to report both the stature and the length of the long bones in two normally developed adult males and one adult female from Smith Sound. To this it is now possible to add larger though less direct data from the group of St. Lawrence Island. We have the stature of many of the living from this place and also the measurements of numerous long bones from the dead of the same group. The relations of the two are given below, together with corresponding data from Smith Sound. There is in general such a striking agreement in the relative proportions that the latter may, it would seem, be used henceforth for stature estimates also in other parts of the Eskimo region.

Length of Principal Long Bones, and Stature in the Living, on the St. Lawrence Island

Long Bones vs. Stature in Eskimo of Smith Sound[199]