Linear Measurements of the Neurocranium Are Better Indicators of Population Differences than Those of the Facial Skeleton: Comparative Study of 1,961 Skulls

The aim of this study is to individualize potential differences between two cranial regions used to differentiate human populations. We compared the neurocranium and the facial skeleton using skulls from the Great Hungarian Plain. The skulls date to the 1st–11th centuries, a long space of time that encompasses seven archaeological periods. We analyzed six neurocranial and seven facial measurements. The reduction of the number of variables was carried out using principal components analysis. Linear mixed effects models were fitted to the principal components of each archaeological period, and then the models were compared using multiple pairwise tests. The neurocranium showed significant differences in seven cases between nonsubsequent periods and in one case, between two subsequent populations. For the facial skeleton, no significant results were found. Our results, which are also compared to previous craniofacial heritability estimates, suggest that the neurocranium is a more conservative region and that population differences can be pointed out better in the neurocranium than in the facial skeleton