Head Reconstruction by the Skull
Bulgarian Academic Monographs No. 8

By Jordan Jordanov
December 2003
Marin Drinov Academic Publishing House
ISBN: 9544309330
216 pages, Illustrated, 6 ½" x 9 ½"
$115.00 Hardcover


In its efforts to find what is basic in the characteristic features of human groups, anthropology has accumulated an enormous quantity of metric data on the general shape of the skull. The study of the correlation among morphological features as well as the critical assessment of the basic rules in the sphere of the outer morphology of the face are directed towards establishing the regularities in the relationships among features and to the formation of the notion of type.

It was precisely this that attracted the author's attention and urged him to deal with the plastic reconstruction of the appearance of people inhabiting the Bulgarian lands by using his own original methodology. Reconstructing the head by the skull is base on certain established correlations between the thickness of the soft tissue, the shapes, dimensions and structures of the parts of the face, on the one hand, and the anatomic peculiarities of the bones of the skull and the relief of their surfaces, on the other.

The existing relationship is verified by statistic data, significant, obtained in measuring the thickness of soft tissues on many points of the skull in individuals of different sex, age, anthropological type and nationality. Reconstructing the head by the skull is a specific activity in which the anthropologist restores the human face according the anatomic and topographic data collected from the study of the particular skull.

CONTENTS: 1. Development of the method of reconstructing the head by the skull. Historical overview. 2. Morphological bases of the method 3. Investigation of the Bulgarian material: a. Specificity of the method applied in Bulgaria b. Investigation on bone macerated material c. Corpse material d. Living individuals e. Summary of Results 4. Basic stages of the method a. Investigating the skull b. Graphic reconstruction and graphic fixation c. Making a sculptural p[portrait d. Finishing the portrait 5. Results of the application of the method: a. Neolithic age b. Eneolithic age c. Bronze age d. Early iron age e. Hellenic age f. Roman age g. Middles ages Conclusions. Literature.


Medical Science

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