The distribution of the most important characteristic of the skulls,
the _cranial index_, will be more clearly apparent from the next
table. Owing to the paucity of crania in some of the series, there
are irregularities between the males and females of the same group,
and the position of the different groups in the line is probably not
in every case correct. Nevertheless, certain conditions are clearly
brought out. It is seen on the whole that the dolichocephaly decreases
in a slight ratio from the north to the south; but its lower extreme is
found on Long Island, Staten Island, and Manhattan Island, New York.
The crania from these three localities show striking resemblances, and
though there are also certain differences, the conclusion seems to be
justified that they belong to one group. It has been suggested[121]
that the Indians of Staten Island were a branch of the Lenape, but the
evidence offered by the skeletal remains gives no corroboration of
this. There may have been Lenape women, or even some Lenape admixture,
in the Staten Island tribe, but the crania of the men show almost
uniformly distinct features which identify them clearly with the
Indians of Manhattan Island and Long Island.
[121] See A. Skinner in The Indians of Greater New York and the Lower
Hudson, edited by Clark Wissler, _Anthropological Papers of the
American Museum of Natural History_, III, 1909.