Atlanto- and Gracile-Med: why's the first more common here? Also: Littorid, North Africa and Balkans

[Etelfrido]

Why does Atlanto-Med seem to be much more popular in classification threads than Gracile-Med?
With respect to the SNPA:

ATLANTO-MEDITERRANID (Littoral European (Deniker))

Tall, straight-nosed and strongly dolichocephalic Mediterranid type, the living equivalent of the skeletal Megalithic type (in the typology of Coon). It is markedly taller and more robust than the Gracile-Mediterranean type, by which it is outnumbered, and with which it is often mixed. The Atlanto-Mediterranid type is an important population element in the Iberian peninsula (prevailing in Catalonia and Valencia), in Italy, and northward along the western European coast, reaching the British Isles in mixed form (cf. North-Atlantid). Coon subsumed all tall-statured Mediterranids (including Pontid) in the Atlanto-Mediterranid category.

It appears to me that Valois in Races Humanes agrees that it's less common than Mediterranean proper, also called Ibero-Insular, and that it's especially found in Spain and France. It's also said that North Africans form a different group.

Les Méditerranéens typiques appartiennent à la variété dite ibéro-insulaire. De corps svelte et élancé, ils ont une taille petite, 1,63 m à 1,64 m ; la tête est nettement dolichocéphale, la face longue et de contour ovalaire, avec un menton arrondi. Le nez, fin et à dos rectiligne, se termine par une pointe effilée. Les yeux sont grands et les lèvres charnues. Ce type habite la péninsule ibérique, le Sud de la France et de l'Italie avec les îles de la Méditerranée occidentale, le Sud-Est des Balkans. Il n'est pas toujours localisé aux régions côtières, car un assez gros noyau s'en rencontre en Russie méridionale.

Une seconde variété, dite atlanto-méditerranéenne, se distingue par une taille plus grande, 1,66 m, et une tête légèrement mésocéphale ; moins fréquente [35] que la précédente, elle s'observe en divers points de l'Espagne et de la France.

Au Sud, la race méditerranéenne occupe toute l'Afrique du Nord, région où elle est plus peut-être chez elle qu'en Europe ; elle y offre une variété dont il sera parlé plus tard, la sous-race saharienne.

But In The Races of Man, Cole says about the Mediterranean races:

(1) Early Mediterranean, now represented only by the Basques. Distinctive owing to their unique blood-group pattern and pre-Indo-European language.
(2) Mediterranean Proper, represented by such people as the Arabs and Spaniards. Light build, medium stature, rather long head, brunet complexion.
(5) Irano-Afghan, represented mainly in Iran, Afghanistan, Baluchistan and north-western India. Heavy build, large and long head, high-bridged and long nose, abundant beard and body hair. Apart from pigment, they are of the same physical type as Nordics.
(a) Atlanto-Mediterranean type. Similar to Irano-Afghan in build, long-head, rugged features. The type of the megalith builders. Now found typically among the Berbers of North Africa and in individuals from Greece to Spain and the British Isles. Often associated with blondism.
(b) Dinaric type. Large, round head, flattened at the back (often artificially); prominent hooked nose; long face; tall stature. Represented by various peoples east of the Adriatic.
(c) Armenoid type. Similar to Dinaric, but with more exaggerated features. Very prominent hooked nose with depressed tip; head flattened at the back (again, usually artificially); full lips; abundant beard and body hair. Found in Armenia and north-eastern Turkey.

It also states that:

Atlanto-Mediterranean type
This tall, straight-nosed, strongly dolichocephalic type forms the main element in the population of North Africa; it is represented in Palestine, Iraq, parts of Arabia and the East Balkans and turns up sporadically in individuals as far north as the British Isles. It was the type of some of the Upper Palaeolithic people of western Europe and of the megalith builders (p. 59), whose imprint on the populations of Crete and the Balearic islands is still visible today. It also forms an important element in the composition of the Greeks and the Bulgars.

Among people of this physical type there is a tendency towards the unusual combination of dark hair and light eyes, as seen in many Irish and Scots, as well as the Riffian Berbers.

So despite being somewhat present among Celts and from Greece to Spain including the Mediterranean islands, Atlanto-Mediterraneans are thought by Cole to be more common among North Africans, Arabs, Levantines and East Balkanites. It would also go against some claims I've seen here that it's a transition from the Mediterranean type to more Northern phenotypes found mainly in Western Europe, being a Western counterpart to Pontid. Methinks here it's associated with the Littorid type.

Consulting Deniker's The Races of Man, the Gracile type's also named Ibero-Insular, just like Valois did.

Dark, dolichocephalic, short race, called Ibero-insular, because it is chiefly found in the Iberian peninsula and the islands of the western Mediterranean. It is found, however, somewhat softened, in France (in Angoumois, Limousin, and Perigord) and in Italy (to the south of the Rome-Ascoli line). Principal characters: very short stature (im. 61 to im. 62 on an average), very elongated head (cephalic index averaging 73 to 76 on the living subject), black, often curled, hair, very dark eyes, tawny skin, straight or turned-up nose, etc. It forms, partly, the "Mediterranean race" of Sergi,1 or the Homo meridionalis of certain authors (Ripley, Lapouge).

He also calls the Atlanto-Med type as Littoral, just like speculated to have been the case in Cole's work.

Darky mesocephalic, tall race. Littoral or Atlanto- Mediterranean race, so styled because it is found in a pure or mixed state along the shores of the Mediterranean from Gibraltar to the mouth of the Tiber, and on several points of the Atlantic coast, from the straits of Gibraltar to the mouth of the Guadalquivir, on the Bay of Biscay, in the lower valley of the Loire, etc. It is not met with anywhere at a greater distance than 120 or 150 miles from the sea. This Littoral race is still little studied; it is distinguished by its moderate dolicho- cephaly or mesocephaly (ceph. ind. on living subject 79 to 80), by its stature above the average (im. 66), and very deep colouring of the hair and eyes. It corresponds pretty well with the "Mediterranean race " of Houze and with the Cro-Magnon race of certain authors.

It is probably with this Littoral race that we must connect a secondary so-called North- Western race, tall, sub-dolichocephalic, with chestnut hair, often almost brown. It is found chiefly in the north-west of Ireland (Fig. 93), in Wales (Fig. 19), and the east of Belgium.

Thus both of those types are combined but still kept distinct from North Africans, put instead under the Arabo=Berber/Semito-Hamitic group.

I. The Arabo-Berber or Semito-Hamitic group occupies the north of Africa as far as about the 15th degree of lat. N., and is composed, as its name indicates, of peoples having as a base the Arab and Berber races. Under the name of Berbers are included populations varying very much in type and manners and customs, speaking either Arabic (Semitic language) or Berberese (Hamitic language). Three-fourths of the " Arabs " of Northern Africa are only Berbers speaking Arabic, and are the more "Arabised" in regard to manners and customs as they are nearer to Asia. The nomads of the Libyan desert and Tripoli have preserved fairly well the Berber type, but they have become Arabs in language and usages. In Tunis and Algeria the Arab influence is still very much felt in the south; in Morocco it is very trifling. From the social point of view, the contrast is great between the settled Berber and the nomadic Arab. To give but one example, the democratic regime of the former, based on private property, bears no resemblance whatever to the autocratic regime of the latter, founded on collective property. But all the Berbers are not of settled habits (example: the Tuaregs), and several tribes have adopted the Arab mode of life.

Physically, the Algero-Tunisian Berber also differs from the Arab. His height is scarcely above the average (im. 67), while the Arab is distinguished by his lofty stature. The Berber head is, generally speaking, not so long as the Arab, although both are dolichocephalic. The face is a regular oval in the Arab, almost quadrangular in the pure Berber. The nose is aquiline in the former, straight or concave in the latter, and moreover, the Berbers have a sort of transverse depression on the brow, above the glabella, which is not seen in the Arabs; on the other hand, they have not so prominent an occiput as the latter. This characterisation is quite general; in reality, among the Arabs, and especially among the Berbers, there is a very great variety of type. According to Collignon, 1 four Berber sub-races or types must be recognised, (i) The Djerba sub-race, characterised by short stature, globular head (ceph. ind. on the living sub. 78 to 81.7), is well represented in the populations of the south-east and the east Tunisian coast, as well as by certain Kabyles, by the Mzabs,2 and the Shawias of the Aures. (2) The Elles type, dolichocephalic, with broad face, occupies the centre of Tunis and the east of Kabylia. (3) The dolichocephalic Berber sub-race, with narrow face and stature above the average, forms the present type in Algeria- Tunisia. (4) The Jerid or Oasis type (Fig. 136), of some- what lofty stature and dark complexion, is well represented around the Tunisian " Shotts."

Among the nomadic Berbers we must mention separately the Tuaregs or Imoshagh, as they call themselves,1 with their manifold divisions (Azjars, Haggars, etc.) spread over the western Sahara. Very characteristic of their costume is the black veil which covers the head leaving only the eyes free, the stone rings on the arms forming also a very national ornament. They employ certain characters in writing peculiar to themselves. In the Maghrebi, who roam over the plateaus situated to the west of the Nile, the Arab strain is very strongly marked. On the other side of the great African river, towards the Red Sea, the Berbers have entirely disappeared and the population is formed of Arabs more of less unmixed. The Bedouins of Egypt (237,000 in 1894) are Berber-Arabs divided into numerous tribes (Aulad-Ali, Gavazi, Eleikat, etc.).

The nomadic or settled Moors (Fig. 137) of the western Sahara, extending from Morocco to the Senegal (the Trarza, the Brakna, etc.), speak Arabic and "Zenagha," which is a Berber dialect. These are Berbers more or less crossed with Negro blood. It must further be observed that the name of Moors is very wrongly applied to the Mussulman inhabitants of the towns of Algeria and Tunis and to the Riffians of Morocco.

The Fellaheen, Mussulmans (635,600 in 1894) of the lower valley of the Nile (as far as the first cataract), mixed descendants of the ancient Egyptians, must be included among the Arabo-Berbers because they have abandoned the speech of their ancestors, adopting that of the Arabs, but many of them have preserved intact the type of the primitive Egyptians, funda- mentally Ethiopian, so well represented on various monuments in the valley of the Nile. 2 The ancient Egyptian language is preserved, however, under the form of the Coptic dialect which, until quite recent times, served as the liturgical language to the Christian section of the inhabitants of Lower Egypt, known by the name of Copts (500,000 in 1894; cephalic index 76, according to Chantre).

We must likewise add to the Arabo-Berber group the Barabra (in the singular Berberi) inhabiting to the number of about 180,000 the part of the Nile valley situated between the first and the fourth cataract. It is a people sprung from the mingling of Ethiopians, Egyptian Fellaheen, and Arabs (ceph. ind. 76). One of the most commercial tribes of this ethnic group is that of the Danagla inhabiting the country of Dongola.

Which definition is right, then? Are Atlanto-Mediterraneans more highly present in the Western shores of Europe or in North Africa and the Balkans? Can it be integrated to the Littoral type or are they distinct? And why are Atlanto-Meds more common here than Gracile-Meds?

[Etelfrido]

Or am I wrong in thinking Atlanto-Mediterranids are more common in classification threads than Gracile-Mediterranids?

[Etelfrido]

Bumpinho.

[Sebastianus Rex]

Or am I wrong in thinking Atlanto-Mediterranids are more common in classification threads than Gracile-Mediterranids?

You are correct, since most people here wrongly equate gracile-med to be very dark haired and with olive skin when the distinction between the two types is about measurements and skull shape not about pigmentation. Gracile/small mediterraneans can also have "aberrant/atypical" lighter pigmentation such as light eyes or light brown hair, and atlanto-meds can have very dark skin (it's mostly the case of non-european atlanto-meds).

Nevertheless it is obvious that with the sharp increase of average height over the past century the population of gracile meds is proportionally smaller than when most anthropological studies were made in the first half of tge 20th century. It's quite common to see families with grandparents or parents considerably shorter, more gracile and smaller headed than their sons/grandchildren.

[Sebastianus Rex]

Normal european small/gracile mediterraneans have exactly the same pigmentation as their atlanto-med countrymen. It's just a question of measurements and skull shape.

A few examples of portuguese gracile meds:

[TrevorXdX]

You are correct, since most people here wrongly equate gracile-med to be very dark haired and with olive skin when the distinction between the two types is about measurements and skull shape not about pigmentation. Gracile/small mediterraneans can also have "aberrant/atypical" lighter pigmentation such as light eyes or light brown hair, and atlanto-meds can have very dark skin (it's mostly the case of non-european atlanto-meds).

Nevertheless it is obvious that with the sharp increase of average height over the past century the population of gracile meds is proportionally smaller than when most anthropological studies were made in the first half of tge 20th century. It's quite common to see families with grandparents or parents considerably shorter, more gracile and smaller headed than their sons/grandchildren.

Do you know any non-European Atlanto-Meds with dark skin? I don't know types of non-European Atlanto-Meds.