长阳青铜时代与大同北魏朝代人类牙齿的形态变异

MORPHOLOGICAL VARIATION OF DENTITION IN TWO ANCIENT INHABITANTS, CHINA

本文记述了湖北长阳县深潭湾青铜时代和山西大同市郊北魏朝代两处墓葬遗址出土的人类牙齿形态变异的状况,提供人们对牙齿形态种种变异的认识,探索非测量性牙齿特征在研究种族和人群之间关系中的意义。

Of late years, many scholars have paid great attention to the morphological study of dental variations. They believe that non-metric dental traits of modern human populations reflect not simply phenotypic plasticity but also genetic change. In the present study, the author described the morphological variations in two ancient inhabitants represented by the skulls from Bronze-Age in Changyang county and Bei Wei dynasty in Datong city. Fifteen discrete characters of the dentition were observed. Based on these findings, the relationship between the ancient inhabitants and neighbouring populations in biological character was discussed. The findings of the present study indicated that the variations of dentition were existed clearly in ancient Chinese as the modern human populations. From the comparison and analysis, the author found that the dental anthropological pattern in Bronze-Age and Bei Wei Dynasty belongs to the same type--'Sinodonty'. However, the former in minor dental morphology is similar to the Southeast Asia(Sundadonty) and the latter is similar to the Northeast Asia(Sinodonty).