A Human Skull from the Medieval Suzaki-Tate Site, Hokkaido

Abstract

An adult male skull (K-25) was found at a medieval castle site (Suzaki-tate) in Kamino-kuni-cho, southern Hokkaido. The skull was covered with a ceramic mortar of Suzu-Ware dated in the mid-fifteenth century A.D.
The morphology of the K-25 skull, both metrically and non-metrically, was far closer to that of the Japanese crania in Honshu than to that of the Ainu crania in Hokkaido.
The cranial features generally accepted as characteristic of the medieval Japanese in Honshu such as dolichocranic vault and extremely flat nasal root were observable, while some modern features as indicated by a moderately high face, relatively high and round orbits, and a high and narrow nasal aperture were also recognized.