trace the ancient Sumerian face eastward among the peoples of Afghanistan and Baluchistan, even to the valley of the Indus.[1]
The most important element, however, appears to have been roundheaded. In the present population of the plateau, at least in the eastern portion, there is a very striking group of roundheads, who are more numerous in the uplands than on the plain.[2] Some may be related to the Dravidians of India, in particular to the Tamil-speaking peoples, among whom there is a marked brachycephalic element.[3] The stature of others is often rather tall, with frequently a marked correlation between this stature and fairness of skin. Such features might argue for an admixture with Nordics; but recalling the fairness of some European Alpines, we might also conjecture that these present-day peoples are the remnant of a proto-Alpine race. If the daring suggestion[4] that the so-called "Armenoids" originated in Turkestan be accepted, the hypothesis that the early inhabitants of Iran were primarily of this stock would be strengthened. Philol-
- ↑ Sir Arthur Keith in Hall and Woolley, Al-ʿUbaid ("Ur Excavations," Vol. I [Oxford, 1927]), p. 216. On this question cf. H. Frankfort, Archeology and the Sumerian Problem (SAOC, No. 4), pp. 40–47.
- ↑ Cf. Buxton, The Peoples of Asia (New York, 1925), pp. 112 f.; W. Z. Ripley, The Races of Europe (New York, 1919), pp. 450 f.; R. B. Dixon, The Racial History of Man (New York, 1923), pp. 309–12.
- ↑ Cf. Dixon, op. cit., p. 263.
- ↑ G. Elliot Smith, Human History (London, 1930), pp. 167 f., and The Ancient Egyptians (new and rev. ed.; London, 1923), pp. 102–5; Buxton, op. cit., pp. 107–13.
