Japan Anthropology Part II

According to EZINESPORTS, the color of the skin is yellowish, which in its shades goes on one side towards the light tones of European and on the other towards dark yellow or brown. Exceptionally and only in boys who go naked and near fishermen, in the summer, the color reaches that of bronze. The influence of the geographical situation is scarce, especially given the almost north to south direction of the Japanese archipelago. The reddish complexion of the newborn is stronger than in Europe and lasts longer. In the cheeks there is little or no red complexion. It is known, moreover, that B. Adachi says that the yellow races, even in the intense degrees of coloring of their skin, cannot recognize a yellow complexion.

At birth, the Japanese have more or less extensive spots, of a more intense color than the surrounding skin, on the sacral region, which are moreover only more pronounced and remain longer in all Mongolian ethnic groups, but which have been found in very numerous ethnic groups. The hair is thick, stiff, vertically implanted on the scalp, of a black often bluish color and has a circular section: it has, in short, the Mongolian characters (see hair). The hairiness is very scarce: in the male, however, the beard, although scarce, is present but formed by rather straight and sparse hair. The eye color is generally brown and only 5% black. The ear is, in half of the cases, without a lobule; its folds are rarely well formed, its size is greater than in the European. Deniker gives the average of 79.4 for the horizontal cephalic index of 153 Japanese skulls, while for 116 individuals on the living it gives the value of 78.1. The data on the living that Baelz offers, projected with the Sera system (see cephalic, indexes) give an absolute predominance of ortho- and hypsi-cephalic forms. The individuals measured being largely Tōkyō students, probably came partly from different provinces of Japan. The ten skulls of C. Toldt are also orthocephalic in height. The 50 Baelz skulls are not usable due to the distance taken by this author for height. A feature of the Japanese orbital region is the more advanced position of the eyeball, so the optic nerve is longer. The orbital index is of ipsiconchia (Baelz), the facial index of leptoprosopia (Toldt), the nasal index is mesorrine (Baelz). Regarding the skeleton, it can be said on the whole that the long bones are rather short and robust: 23 humeri, of both sexes, gave the Baelz an average of 290 mm. long, 23 ulna 243 mm.; 26 radî 224 mm .: 92 femurs, between males and females, gave Bello y Rodriguez a length of 410.5 for males and 376.2 for females; 92 tibias gave 311.2 and 299.7 respectively. The small anterior-posterior diameter of the section as well as the low torsion are characteristic of the Japanese femur. The tibia has a large section (euryknemic) and has a small torsion. The bones of the foot and hand show significant differences from the European ones (Adachi).

But also the knowledge of the structure of the soft parts is now quite advanced. Let us briefly mention: in the muscular system, the remarkable frequency with which an abnormal muscle occurs, the sternal muscle, also known as presternal, is very important, a muscle that is so far of enigmatic interpretation, compared to the function it could have when its presence was normal: other singularity relative to it is that there is no animal in which there is a formation clearly comparable to this muscle, which is a completely human formation. So too it is worth noting: the strong frequency of the pyramidal muscle of the abdomen; the strong frequency of the increase in the number of heads of the humeral biceps, the rarer absence of the small palmar, the strong frequency of perforation of the piriformis by the sciatic nerve; The  more frequent absence of the puny insole. In the liver the vena cava is free from the liver tissue backwards, much more frequently according to Kudo and Hasebe, than in Europeans. Kudo and Mori report that in the uropoietic apparatus there is a horseshoe shape in the kidney; however it is rare. According to K. Hasebe, the Japanese kidney has a stronger frequency than a type in which the pelvis is broad in the vertical sense and the calyxes are short. The arterial system has been thoroughly studied by the Adachi, with a large comparison with Europeans and other races. Thus, for example, the internal maxilla passes inside the external pterygoid muscle very rarely, while it is the norm for Europeans. The same artery passes into the Japanese normally, that is, in most cases, into the buccal nerve. We also remember: the relative low frequency of the anterior communicating artery of the brain, the deep palmar arch that passes more frequently forward the ulnar nerve; the bifurcation of the abdominal aorta which occurs much more often on the fifth lumbar; the higher frequency in the Japanese of a common trunk for the medial, lateral and deep circumflex of the femur (progressive character).