Palla Ákos szerk.: Az Országos Orvostörténeti Könyvtár közleményei 30. (Budapest, 1964)

Dr. T. Tóth: The Principal Questions of Anthropological Taxonomy

of Europoid and Mongoloid races which, according to present knowledge, took place during the Paleometallic age (III—II. milleneum, B. C: Debetz, 1947, 1948a) in the Minusinsk Basin. It is known that following the XVth century geographical isolation of the great races of mankind on the various continents ceased because of population movement (for the Negroids) or territorial mobility (for the Europoids and Mongoloids). These historical — and frequently colonising — processes were followed by long periods of hybridization which in themselves indicate both the interbreeding ability of the great races of mankind and their biological unity. (Classical examples are the ethnic groups of mixed origin such as the Pitcairn colony, the Rehobot Bastards, Jamaica, Hawaii, and Kisar; Rodenwaldt, 1927; Dunn, 1928; Fischer, 1913; Roginskij — Levin, 1955; Comas, 1961; Shapiro, 1951; and Trevor, 1953). It should be noted that according to classification race does not actually have a general taxonomical meaning, or rather a unanimously accepted definition. Here anthropology does not possess such a systematic help as for the definition of species. But it should still be mentioned that race, as a geographical isolate, is indentified with subspecies. On the other hand the subspecies is a local population group which is geographically isolated and taxonomically different from all other groups in the same species. All these show the synonymy of the terms subspecies and race in general use. In view of my study the most essential point is that race is an intraspecific taxonomic unit. At the same time the zoological interpretation of geographical isolation does not satisfy anthropological requirements. This is connected to man's characteristic (biological and social) evolution since the criteria used in setting up races (constancy of characteristics, complexes of characteristics, areal factors) are indentical for both men and animals, but at the same time the concept of human races is fundamentally different to that of the animal kingdom. The significance and supraspecific taxonomical effect of adaptation related to the racial features of man becomes abolished in the Holocene. For instance the distinctive characteristics of Mongoloids (straight hair of coarse texture, broad face, well-developed cheek