Craniofacial Features of Southeast Asians and Jomonese: A Reconsideration of Their Microevolution Since the Late Pleistocene

Abstract

Univariate and multivariate statistical procedures were applied to 24 measurements recorded in 944 crania from East and Southeast Asia and Oceania to assess the possible origins and affinities of these populations with special reference to the origin of Jomonese. The results show that Jomonese are much more like the prehistoric mainland Southeast Asians and recent aboriginal people in Borneo, the Dajaks, than like East Asians, Polynesians (Hawaiians), western Micronesians (Guamanians), Melanesians, and Australians. The orthodox view of Southeast Asian prehistory has held that the region was occupied by Australomelanesians before the southern expansion of Chinese between 2, 000 and 4, 000 years ago. The contradictory findings presented here form the basis of an alternative view that Southeast Asian craniofacial features resulted from local evolution, not admixture. The present findings favor the prehistoric Southeast Asians, with lesser admixture with East Asian invaders from the north, as the most likely source for not only the present-day Southeast Asians, but also prehistoric Jomonese, and the Pacific populations.