Pedagogical Anthropology, Maria Montessori [online e book reader TXT] 📗
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It should be noted that in the foregoing table the normal children include both the studious and the non-studious.
[4] See further, as to these fundamental ideas: Laloy, L'Évolution de la Vie. Petite Encyclopédie du XX Siècle; Claude Bernard, Leçons sur les Phènomènes de la Vie; Le Dentu, in La Matière Vivante, et Théorie nouvelle de la Vie; Luciani, Fisiologia Umana, in the first chapter: "Material Substratum of Vital Phenomena."
[5] Consult: Haeckel, Anthropogenie; E. Perrier, Les Colonies animales et la Formation des Organismes; Richet, L'Effort vers la Vie, et la Théorie des Causes finales.
[6] Correns: Concerning the Laws of Heredity.
[7] Translator's note.
[8] Translator's note.
[9] De Giovanni, Op. cit., p. 236. Cases referring to the first morphologic combination.
[10] De Giovanni, Op. cit.
[11] De Giovanni, Op. cit.
[12] Boxich, Contribution to the Morphological, Clinical and Anthropological Study of delinquents.
[13] Deniker, Races et peuples de la terre.
[14] Topinard, Elementi di Antropologia.
[15] Quétélet, Proporzioni medie (mean Proportions).
[16] Livi, Antropometria Militare (Military Anthropometry).
[17] Montessori, Caratteri fisici delle giovani donne del Lazio.
[18] Translator's note.
[19] Fig. 25 and those following it, dealing with deformities resulting from labour, are taken from Pieraccini's great work, The Pathology of Labour.
[20] Pieraccini, Op. cit.
[21] Alfredo Niceforo, Les classes pauvres (the poorer classes).
[22] Taken from Livi: On the Development of the Body in relation to the profession and the social condition. Rome, Voghera, 1897.
[23] Marro, Puberty.
[24] Cited by Pagliani, Human Development, according to age, sex, etc.
[25] Raciborski, cited by Marro, Puberty.
[26] Idem.
[27] Rousseau, Émile, cited by Marro.
[28] It should be noted that sexual precocity or vice retards the development of puberty, while healthful psychic stimuli are favourable to it. Hence it was a right instinct that led us to give the name of sin and vice to what retards the normal development of life, and virtue and honour to what is favourable to it.—Author's note.
[29] Compare The method of Scientific Pedagogy applied to infantile education in the "Children's Houses," Montessori: Casa Editr. Lapi, 1909.
[30] Moige, Nouvelle Iconographie de la Salpétrière, 1894.
[31] Apert, Op. cit.
[32] Cited by Marro.
[33] Cited by Figueira, Semejotica Infantile, p. 121.
[34] Cited by Figueira (Rio Janeiro) in his volume, Elementi di Semejotica infantile, 1906. From this volume, which contains the result of the most modern investigations in pediatry, I have taken a number of data regarding the weight of children.
[35] Livi: Antropometria.
CHAPTER IICRANIOLOGY
Having finished the study of general biological questions and of the body considered in its entirety, we may now pass on to analyse its separate parts, treating in connection with each of such parts the social and pedagogic questions which may pertain to it.
The parts of the body which we shall take under consideration are: the head, the thorax, the pelvis and the limbs.
The Head.—When we pass from the body as a whole to a more particularised study of the separate parts, it is proper to begin with the head because it is the most important part of the whole body. The older anthropology, and biological and criminal anthropology as well were very largely built up from a study of the head; a study so vast and important that it has come to constitute a separate branch of science: craniology.
The fact is that the characteristics manifested by the cranium are chiefly in the nature of mutations rather than variations, and consequently the anthropological data relating to the cranium correspond more directly to the characteristics of the species, or in the case of man, to the characteristics of race. Hence they are of special interest to the general study of anthropology. But when these imitative characteristics, which are naturally constant and have a purely biological origin, undergo alterations, they are to be explained, not as variations, but as pathological deviations; and for this reason criminal anthropology has drawn a very large part of its means of diagnosis of anomalies and of degeneration from malformations of the cranium.
Furthermore, the cranium together with the vertebral column represents not only the characteristics of species, but also those of the genus; in fact, it corresponds to the cerebro-spinal axis, which is the least variable part of the body throughout the whole series of vertebrates; just as, on the contrary, the limbs represent the most variable part. Indeed, if we study separately the cranio-vertebral system and the limbs, through the whole series of vertebrates, we shall discover gradual alterations in the former, and sudden wide alterations in the latter. The cerebro-spinal axis (and hence the cranio-vertebral system) shows from species to species certain progressive differences that suggest the idea of a gradual sequence of modifications (from the amphioxus to man) to which we could apply the principle, Natura non facit saltus: while the limbs on the contrary, even though they preserve certain obvious analogies to the fundamental anatomic formation of the skeleton, undergo profound modifications—being reduced in certain reptiles to mere rudimentary organs, developing into the wing of the bird, the flying membrane of the bat, and the hand of man.
Since it is not only a characteristic of species and race, but of genus as well, the cranium constitutes one of the most constant anatomical features. For the same reason it is less subject to variations due to environment, and from this point of view offers slight interest to pedagogic anthropology. But since the cranium contains the organ on which the psychic manifestations depend, we have a deep interest in knowing its human characteristics, its phases of development, and its normal limits.
Head and CraniumThe term Head is applied to the living man; the Cranium, from which this branch of science takes its name, is the skeleton of the head. The cranium is composed of two parts, which may be virtually separated, in the lateral projection, by a straight line passing through the external orbital apophysis and extending to the auricular foramen, thus separating the facial from the cerebral portion of the cranium. Hence the cranium is the skeleton of the head in its entirety, and is divisible into the cerebral cranium and the facial cranium.
The Cranium.—The cranium is a complex union of a number of flat, curved bones united together by means of certain very complicated arborescent sutures, and forming a hollow osseous cavity of rounded form. I will briefly indicate the bones which form its external contour. On the anterior part is the frontal bone, terminated by the suture which unites it to the two parietal bones: the coronal suture; while the two parietal bones are joined together by the median or sagittal suture, which forms a sort of T with the other suture.
On the posterior side is the occipital bone, which is also joined to the two parietal bones, by means of the occipital or lambdoidal suture. Below the two parietal bones, in a lateral direction, are the two temporal bones; and between the temporal and parietal bones are situated the great wings of the sphenoid. The main body of the sphenoid is at the base of the cranium. Besides these there is another, internal bone, the ethmoid.
The Face.—The skeleton of the face is composed of fourteen bones; some of these are external and lend themselves to measurement; others which are internal and hidden contribute to the completion of the delicate scaffolding of this most important portion of the skeleton. The principal bones of the face are: the two zygomatic bones (articulating with the temporal, frontal and maxillary bones); the two nasal bones (articulating with the frontal and with the ascending branch of the maxillary, and uniting above to form the bridge of the nose; this is a bone of great importance in anthropology, because it determines the naso-frontal angle and the formation of the nose); the two upper maxillary bones, or upper jaw (articulating together in front to form the subnasal region; laterally with the zygomatic bones; above with the nasal bones; internally with each other, to form the palate, and posteriorly with the palatine bones); the mandible or lower jaw (a single bone, and the only movable bone in the cranium), articulating with the temporal bones by means of a condyle, and the separate parts of which are distinguished as the body of the mandible and the ascendant branches, which are united to the cranium.
Fig. 39.—Note the line of division between the cerebral and facial cranium; in addition to this the sutures are shown which divide the frontal, parietal, occipital and temporal bones. PD. Coronal Suture; DL. Sagittal Suture; AL. Lambdoidal Suture.
The bones of lesser importance, which are interior and hidden are: the two lacrymal bones (situated at the inner angle of the orbitary cavity), the vomer or osseous septum of the nose; the two bones in the nose which lie on each side of the vomer and are known as the turbinated bones (concha nasalis); and the two palate bones (which form the backward continuation of the palatine vault constituted by the maxillary bones).
Human Cranium and Animal Cranium.—The dividing line between the cerebral and facial cranium is of great importance in anthropology, because the relative proportions between these two parts of the cranium form a human characteristic, contrasting widely with the animal characteristics; and they offer a simple criterion for determining the higher or lower type of the human cranium. (Compare in this connection Fig. 40, skulls of the higher mammals and of man.)
Fig. 40.
The illustration represents a number of different animal skulls; and at the top are two human skulls, the one of an Australian and the other of a European. It will be seen that the proportions between the facial and cerebral portions are very different; in the animals, even in the higher orders such as the primates (orang-utan, gorilla, etc.), the facial and masticatory parts predominate over the cerebral.
One might even say that the skeleton gives us at a glance the characteristic psychological difference; the animal eats, man thinks; that is, the animal is destined only to vegetate, to feed itself; man is an entirely different species; he has a very different task before him; he is the creative being, who, through thought and labour, is destined to subjugate and transform the world.
There are still other characteristic differences between the animal and the human skull. The cerebral cranium of the ape is not only smaller but it is furnished with strong bony ridges, to serve as points of attachment for powerful muscles intended to protect the cranial cavity. The human skull is completely devoid of such ridges; it is perfectly smooth,
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