Tag Archives: Anthropology

SciCoMove Training Session:  a participant’s experience

By Emilia Mac Donagh, UNLP

From the 4 to the 8 of July, the postgraduate course “HISTORIA NATURAL, COLECCIONES, ARCHIVOS Y MUSEOS. SIGLOS XIX Y XX” took place in the Museum of La Plata. As a PhD fellow at the Faculty of Natural Sciences, I enrolled. But honestly in the beginning I was only moved by how catchy I found the name and it´s affinity to my thesis topic. At that moment I wasn’t aware of the fact that the academic proposal had its origin in a SciCoMove workshop/training session. But the surprise could not have been more gratifying. The fusion of both opened the gates of the SciCoMove Project and allowed people with different backgrounds and from different points of Argentina to take a look at the work that’s currently being done within this project.

It was an intense week of hard work and exchanges. The course offered expositions and testimonies by professionals from different places like Switzerland, France, and Argentina. But, moreover, it was marked by the constant promotion of dialogue and exchange among everyone who was involved. And that included those of us who were taking it as a postgraduate course, the teachers, and the PhD student members of the SciCoMove Project.  Being able to debate, share ideas, and co-create with people from different places and academic backgrounds, and who participate in projects like SciCoMove, represents a great opportunity of academic and professional growth.

Throughout the week, Irina, Susana and Natalie invited us to review the history of all museums as institutions, focusing in the particular case of the La Plata Museum, where we actually were. Being inside the museum was not a minor detail when breaking down it’s emergence story, and understanding that it is not as lineal and fluid as it is usually portrayed.

We wandered around the museum, and visited the exhibitions, the deposits, and the archive. For some this implied their first time in the museum and its guts. And for others like me, this meant a known place unveiling new connotations and possibilities. The study and analysis of collections, archives and objects that are or have been a part of the museums allows to revisit and rethink how the boundaries of the scientific field are and have been historically built. From that perspective the course proposed a guide to consider what (and who) are conceived inside those borders as well as how this is constantly being reshaped.

One of the things that blew my mind during the course was the idea of objects in museums and collections as artifacts. This is one of the pillars in which the SciCoMove project strands in order to tell how these objects have been moved around different places.  I was familiar with the concept of artifact and its traditional application in archaeology. Artifact, as a concept is traditionally used in opposition of what is pristine and untouched. So, anything that has signs of being exposed to some kind of human work, becomes an artifact. Of course, all tools found in an archaeological context easily fit this classification. Now the interesting part comes when we define what is this “human work”, and how it impacts the objects.

Sometime ago a friend archaeologist had revealed to me that this concept had many more possibilities, as he implied in his work that the soils and strata where the archaeological objects were found could be seen as an artifact too. And I found this somehow related. Just as the soils, the “natural” objects often found in the museums are normally conceived just as a part of nature, portraited in the exhibitions, or safeguarded in the collections. Then, for example, we could think about a piece of dinosaur bone. It probably has been dug out, reconditioned after, placed in a particular place according to one particular bone structure, and displayed in a room charged with conjectures about it. All those procedures involve changes in the objects, even if they are meant for preservation. When thinking about it, to classify, arrange chronologically, restore, build up, and all other actions that take place when working within museums and collections are human work. The same goes to any type of object, no matter how “natural” or “cultural” we might think it is, from the point when an object becomes something collected, categorised, saved, etc. it begins to be conceptualised. And that is the key to start talking about artifacts, because to give meaning is one of the firsts and most basic human works.

From a historical perspective, with case-study examples and in line with the goal of the SciCoMove Project, the course aimed to make evident that when constructing scientific knowledge, no man nor woman of science acts alone. Neither in the past or present.

At the beginning of the week, Irina Podgorny insisted that we let aside the idiomatic barriers and size the situation to meet other people and even make friends. Following her advice, along the week we saw how the theoretical and conceptual talks slipped out of the classes and continued unto the bars. There´s no better empiric proof than that of what role company, assembly, and the collective play for the generation of knowledge.

Thereby, my bond with museums has a long history. Since I started studding anthropology in the Collage of Natural Sciences, which is associated with the Museum of La Plata. And now I am carrying out my PhD studies considering museums as spaces of science communication and heritage safeguard, and on how to problematize that, within the construction of scientific knowledge. With that in mind, participating of the course has been a very valuable and rewarding experience, especially considering the opportunity to get in touch with the SciCoMove Project.

I have a Bachelor´s Degree in Anthropology by the Facultad de Ciencias Naturales, Universidad Nacional de La Plata (UNLP), where I now also taught. In 2021 I got a University Diploma in Public Science Communication, by the UNICEN. Currently I am carrying out my PhD, working in the Laboratory of Applied Ethnography Investigations, and with a scholarship from the UNLP, under the tutoring of Gabriela Morgante (LINEA UNLP-CIC) and Mariano Bonomo (Dept. Arqueología, Museo de La Plata). My thesis centers  on museums as places for the collective construction of knowledge and the heritage safeguard, and takes place in Molinos (Calchaquí Valleys, Salta)

SciCoMove Training Session:  La experiencia de participar

By Emilia Mac Donagh, UNLP

Del 4 al 8 de Julio en el Museo de La Plata, se desarrolló el curso de posgrado “HISTORIA NATURAL, COLECCIONES, ARCHIVOS Y MUSEOS. SIGLOS XIX Y XX”. Como estudiante del doctorado en Ciencias Naturales de la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo, me inscribí al curso, honestamente impulsada sólo por lo llamativo del título y la afinidad con mi tema de estudio. Ignoraba, al momento, que partía de la propuesta de un taller y un curso de formación de SciCoMove con título homónimo. Pero la sorpresa no pudo haber sido más grata.  La fusión de ambas instancias permitió a abrir las puertas de SciCoMove, y que personas con diferentes formaciones y de diferentes puntos de la Argentina pudiéramos dar un vistazo al trabajo que están realizando actualmente desde el proyecto.

Fue una ardua semana de trabajo e intercambios. El curso brindó exposiciones y testimonios de profesionales de diferentes lugares, como Suiza, Francia y Argentina.  Pero, sobre todo, estuvo marcado el fomento del diálogo y el intercambio, entre todas las personas que participan. Y esto incluye a las personas que lo estábamos tomando como curso de posgrado, a las docentes a cargo y a los doctorandos de SciCoMove. Debatir, compartir ideas y construir con personas de otras formaciones, de otros lugares representa una gran oportunidad para el crecimiento personal y profesional.

A lo largo de los encuentros las docentes del curso nos invitaron a revisar la historia de los museos, en general, y tomando como caso particular el Museo de La Plata, donde además nos encontrábamos físicamente. Estar allí no resultó menor a la hora de desglosar el relato del surgimiento de este espacio, y comprender que no es tan lineal y fluido como a veces se lo presenta.

Pudimos recorrer el museo, las muestras, los depósitos y el archivo. Para algunos implicaba conocer por primera vez el Museo y sus entrañas, aunque para otros representaba un espacio ya conocido, cotidiano, o hasta nuestro espacio de trabajo, develando nuevas connotaciones y posibilidades. El estudio y análisis de colecciones, los archivos y los objetos que forman o han formado pate de museos permite rever y repensar cómo se construyen hoy en día, y cómo se han construido históricamente las fronteras del campo científico. Desde allí el curso nos proponía una guía para ver qué (y quiénes) se conciben dentro de estos límites, pero también cómo estos últimos se reformulan constantemente.

Uno de los aspectos que más me fascinó del curso fue la propuesta de concebir a los objetos, que se hallan en los museos, como artefactos. Este es uno de los pilares del Proyecto SciCoMove para el estudio del movimiento de estos objetos. Por mi formación de gado, estaba familiarizada con la aplicación más tradicional que el concepto artefacto posee para la arqueología. “Artefacto” suele usarse en oposición a lo que se piensa prístino e intacto. Así, cualquier cosa que presente signos de haber estado expuesto a algún tipo de trabajo -acción- humano, se convierte en artefacto. Las herramientas halladas en un contexto arqueológico, por supuesto que encajan fácilmente en esta clasificación. Ahora, la parte más interesante llega cuando intentamos definir qué es “acción humana”, y cómo impacta en los objetos.

Algún tiempo atrás, un amigo arqueólogo me había revelado que este concepto posee muchas más posibilidades, el mismo insinuaba en un trabajo que los suelos y los estratos donde se hallan los restos arqueológicos pueden ser vistos como artefactos también. Encuentro esto de alguna forma relacionado con lo que se planteaba en el curso. Como los suelos, los “objetos naturales” que comúnmente encontramos en los museos, suelen concebirse como una parte de la naturaleza expuestas en las muestras, o salvaguardadas en las colecciones. Podríamos, por ejemplo, pesar en un fragmento de hueso de dinosaurio entonces. Probablemente fue excavado, extraído, reacondicionado, colocado en una posición particular de a cuerdo a una estructura ósea particular, y presentado en una habitación, cargada con conjeturas sobre el mismo. Todos esos procedimientos involucran cambios en los objetos, incluso si persiguen fines de preservación. Al pensarlo, clasificar, ordenar cronológicamente, restaurar, reconstruir, y todo el resto de las acciones que se llevan a cabo con el trabajo en museos y con colecciones, son acciones puramente humanas. Y lo mismo aplica apara cualquier tipo de objeto, sin importar que tan “natural” o “cultural” creamos que sea, desde el momento en el que un objeto pasa a ser algo recolectado, categorizado, guardado, etc. pasa a estar conceptualizado. Y esa es la clave para empezar a hablar de artefactos, porque dar significado es una de las acciones humanas más básicas.

Desde una perspectiva histórica, con ejemplos de estudios de caso, y en línea con los objetivos del proyecto SciCoMove, el curso pretendía dejar, en evidencia que a la hora de construir conocimiento científico ningún hombre o mujer de ciencia actúa sólo. Ni en el pasado, ni hoy en día.

Al empezar la semana, Irina Podgorny (una de las docentes a cargo del curso) nos insistió en que dejáramos de lado las barreras idiomáticas y aprovecháramos la ocasión para conocer a otras personas y hasta incluso “hacernos amigos”. Siguiendo su consejo, vimos como lo largo de la semana, las charlas conceptuales y teóricas terminaban filtrándose fuera del aula y seguían en los bares. No hay mejor comprobante empírico que este del rol que juega lo colectivo, la compañía y el encuentro para la generación de conocimiento.

Mi relación con los museos se remonta ya a un tiempo atrás. Estudie la licenciatura en antropología en la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales de la UNLP, que está asociada al Museo de La Plata. Mi especialización en comunicación pública de la ciencia, influyó en que actualmente para mi doctorado me centre en y considere a los museos como espacios de comunicación de ciencia, además de salvaguarda del patrimonio, y sobre como problematizar esto en el marco de la construcción de conocimiento científico. Entendiendo esto, fue una experiencia muy valiosa y gratificante haber participado del curso, con la oportunidad de entrar en contacto del proyecto SciCoMove.

Estudié Antropología en la Facultad de Ciencias Naturales de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata, donde actualmente soy docente. En 2022 terminé una Diplomatura universitaria en Comunicación Pública de la Ciencia, en la UniCen. Actualmente cuento con una beca doctoral de la UNLP, con lugar de trabajo en el Laboratorio de Investigaciones Etnográficas Aplicadas, bajo la dirección de Gabriela Morgante (LINEA UNLP-CIC) y la co-dirección de Mariano Bonomo (Diisión Arqueología, Museo de La Plata). Mi tesis se centra en los museos como espacios para comunicación y construcción colectiva de conocimiento, así como para la puesta en valor del patrimonio, en la localidad de Molinos (Valles Calchaquíes, Salta).

From Paris to La Plata: the story of the cast skull of Quiberon

By Franco Orlandi, UNITO

Among the many skulls and casts preserved in the anthropological collection of the Museum of La Plata, the cast skull numbered 1745 in the catalogue complied by then-director Robert Lehmann-Nitsche (1872-1938) in 1911, is of particular interest to learn more about the circulation of scientific knowledge and collections between Europe and America in the 19th century.  

The story of the cast 1745 begins in France in December 1864, when a group of quarry workers began excavating on a hill in the Quiberon peninsula to extract stones. The hill of Manné-Beker-Noz, located near the village of Saint-Pierre (Morbihan, France), had been known to the local people since time immemorial for the dolmen that surmounted its crest. During the excavation of the site, the quarrymen found by chance a prehistoric tomb containing the skeletal remains of an adult male and a terracotta urn of large size (fig. 1). After being informed of the discovery, Alexandre Gressy, a member of the learned society of Morbihan, went to the site to study and collect the bones and the artifact. In this he was helped by the colleague René Galles, who drew sketches of the archeological finds.

Sketch of the tomb of Quiberon, «Bulletin de la Societé polymathique du Morbihan » (1865), p. 52.

The discovery was reported a few months later on the journal of the Societé polymathique du Morbihan by its president, the physician Gustave de Closmadeuc (1828-1918). In addition to being the chief surgeon of the Vannes hospital, Closmadeuc was also an avid archeologist. In his article he explained that the importance of the discovery consisted first of all in the good state of conservation of the Man of Quiberon, which would allow for a detailed anthropological examination. For this purpose, Closmadeuc had taken upon himself the task of putting together the different cranial fragments found in the tomb and sent the reconstructed skull to the Laboratory of Anthropology directed by Paul Broca in Paris for analysis:  

«By dint of patience I managed to match and glue together most of the cranial fragments. I was thus able to reconstitute the head, which is currently in the hands of Mr. Broca and Mr. Follin […] who offered me their help. […] We will then leave it to our eminent colleagues to inform us about the anthropological value of the skull that we have entrusted to their examination» (Closmadeuc 1865, pp. 42-3).

Paul Broca (1824-1880), the most famous anthropologist of nineteenth century France, published the results of his analysis on both the «Bulletin of the Societé polymathique»and the Bulletin of the Society of Anthropology of Paris. Like Closmadeuc, Broca stressed the extraordinary significance of the archeological discovery in Quiberon. «My dear confrere», he wrote in a letter to Closmadeuc in June 1865, «The skull of Quiberon that you sent us is one of the most important remains of the Stone Age» (Broca 1865, p. 47). Most ethnologists and linguists of the time believed that, during the Stone Age, Europe had been populated by a backward and racially homogenous human group marked by the brachycephalic head shape. This group, scholars maintained, was later replaced by the more civilized Indo-Aryan people, whose skulls were dolicocephalic. The Quiberon skull, however, seemed to tell a very different story: «This skull is the most dolicocephalic of all the Stone Age skulls that have been found so far in France» Broca pointed out with surprise (fig. 2).

Figure 2. Cast skull of the Man of Quiberon preserved in the Museum of La Plata. The dolicocephalic shape of the head is clearly visible. Picture by Nathalie Richard.

Since archeological evidence suggested that the Man of Quiberon had enjoyed high social status, Broca decided to compare the measurements of his skull with those of 90 upper-class nineteenth century Parisians. He concluded that the Quiberon skull «bears, in relation to the average type of the modern French, many characteristics of inferiority similar to those which are present today in certain savage, or at least highly barbaric, races». For Broca, the shape of the Quiberon skull resembled that of «negroes and Neo-caledonians». In his works, he distinguished two types of dolicocephaly: the frontal dolicocephaly, found among the «Germanic races», and the occipital dolicocephaly, typical of «African and Oceanic races». The first was characterized by a highly developed frontal region and was therefore considered an indicator of high intelligence. The second, on the other hand, was marked by a highly developed occipital region at the back of the skull, which was believed to be the seat of instinct and therefore considered an indicator of a more primitive and animal mind.

By underlining its features of inferiority and characterizing its occipital dolicocephaly as primitive and African (and thus very different from the frontal dolicocephaly found among civilized people like Indo-Aryans), the French anthropologist tried to solve the contradiction that the Quiberon skull had exposed: the presence of early dolicocephalic skulls in Stone Age France. Rather than questioning the existing theories on the racial composition of prehistoric Europe, Broca resorted to the explanation that the Man of Quiberon belonged to a human group less racially evolved than Indo-Aryans.

The skull of Quiberon remained in Paris, where it became part of the collection of the Society of Anthropology.  In 1874, however, a copy of it was sent to Buenos Aires. In fact, in that year Broca exchanged a number of specimens with the Argentinian amateur collector Francisco Pascasio Moreno (1852-1919), who he had never met in person but whom he knew through a mutual acquaintance with Carlos Germàn Burmeister (1807-1892), director of the National Museum of Natural History of Buenos Aires. Among the 15 casts that Broca sent to Argentina and that later became part of the collection of the Museum of La Plata was the Quiberon skull. The original specimen remained in France, probably to allow further studies of it. On his part, Moreno sent to Broca a series of Patagonian prehistoric skulls, although we do not know which ones and in what number. As a result of this exchange, Moreno was appointed correspondent of the Society of Anthropology of Paris and his article on the prehistoric cemeteries of Patagonia was published in its journal.

In conclusion, the (cast) skull of Quiberon tells us the story of specimens and ideas that travelled from both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and not just from the peripheries to the centers. It also shows how 19th century collecting practices were closely intertwined with racial theory and physical anthropology’s attempt to elaborate a racial hierarchy of the world’s population.

Figure 3. Picture by Nathalie Richard.

Selected sources and bibliography

Claude Blanckaert, De la race à l’évolution. Paul Broca et l’anthropologie française. 1850-1900, Paris, L’Harmattan, 2009.

Paul Broca, Étude anthropologique du crane de Manné-Beker-Noz, «Bulletin de la Societé polymathique du Morbihan » (1865), pp. 47-49.

Gustave Closmadeuc, Tombeau découvert au Manné-Beker-Noz, Bulletin de la Societé polymathique du Morbihan (1865), pp. 39-46.  

Máximo Farro, La formación del Museo de La Plata. Coleccionistas, comerciantes, estudiosos y naturalistas viajeros a fines del siglo XIX, Rosario, Prohistoria, 2009.

Robert Lehmann-Nietsche, Catálogo de la Sección Antropológica del Museo de La Plata, Buenos Aires, Coni Hermanos, 1911, http://naturalis.fcnym.unlp.edu.ar/id/20110709008868

Chris Manias, Race, Science, and the Nation. Reconstructing the Ancient Past in Britain, France and Germany, Abingdon, Routledge, 2013.

Irina Podgorny, Margaret Lopes, El desierto en una vitrina. Museos e historia natural en la Argentina, Mexico, Limusa, 2008 (2e éd., Rosario, Prohistoria, 2014).

Nathalie Richard, Travelling skulls. About some skulls and casts kept in the storerooms of the Museum of La Plata, 2022, https://scicomove.hypotheses.org/959

Mediciones y estadísticas en los archivos de Cesare Lombroso

Por Marina Laura Sardi, Universidad Nacional de La Plata

Para descifrar si el delincuente difería del hombre cuerdo o del alienado, Cesare Lombroso se abocó a la comparación de cuerpos, rostros y cráneos. Esto fue en parte posible porque entre los años 1864 y 1876 cuando enseñaba la clínica de las enfermedades mentales en el hospital de Pavía, Italia, organizó una colección de cráneos, cerebros y máscaras faciales de las personas fallecidas. Esta colección incluía pocos criminales y, en cambio, un mayor número de enfermos mentales, además de algunos soldados que constituyeron una referencia de personas honestas para comparar a los delincuentes. Junto con estos materiales, distintos médicos realizaron libros de registros con datos biográficos (nombre, edad, lugar de origen, enfermedad, etc.), características antropométricas (estatura, peso, pilosidad, presencia de tatuajes, etc.) y las características de los órganos (cerebro, corazón, pulmones, bazo, riñones, etc.) extraídos durante la disección.

Por aquellos años, la antropología buscaba estandarizar sus prácticas. Esto consistía en la selección de las estructuras anatómicas de las que pudieran leerse ciertos indicadores, la determinación de las mediciones apropiadas y, en ocasiones, la provisión de instrumentos que permitieran medirlas. Distintos investigadores, en sus propios laboratorios se dedicaron a dicha búsqueda y tomaría todavía varios años de debates alcanzar algunos acuerdos.

El método de la antropología criminal, de la cual Lombroso fue uno de sus principales proponentes, consistía en la toma de mediciones con las que los antropólogos físicos distinguían razas. Asimismo, consistía en la observación de “anomalías craneanas”, que predominarían en los malhechores (Lombroso 1876, 1878, 1896), tales como presencia de sutura media frontal y de la fosa occipital mediana, arcos superciliares y seno frontal desarrollados, frente huidiza, cráneos pesados, huesos wormianos, asimetría craneana y plagiocefalia, entre otras. Sin embargo, Lombroso recién logró normalizar un método de observación y comparación luego de haber revisado los viejos registros y revisitado su colección de cráneos.

En los archivos del Museo de Antropología Criminal “Cesare Lombroso” (Turín, Italia) es posible detectar algunos nombres, caligrafías, trazos, anotaciones al margen, tachaduras, conteos y cálculos matemáticos mediante el cual el médico italiano construyó los indicadores y el corpus empírico que le permitieron edificar sus inferencias sobre la relación entre el cuerpo físico y la criminalidad. En la Figura 1 se observa un ejemplo de los registros elaborados en el Hospital de Pavía, numerados como 162 (máscara) y 163 (cráneo) en los que se indica: “Palazzoli Giovanni, de 40 años. Ladrón muerto en febrero 1866 […] Individuo de alta estatura 1,70 de cabello negro, bien nutrido, con notable desarrollo de la corpulencia y de los órganos genitales […] Signos de tatuajes. P.S. en el brazo derecho está representado un postillón, en el izquierdo una mujer desnuda que baila sobre cuerda […]”, cuyo dibujo se adjunta al texto. A continuación, se describe la causa de muerte (tuberculosis) y las características de algunos órganos, tales como “hipertrofia de corazón”. En este registro se pueden observar los trazos realizados en color rojo por Lombroso sobre características físicas que, según él, serían más frecuentes o más pronunciadas en los delincuentes. Otras anotaciones en azul indican el peso del cerebro, 1310 (gr), y mediciones sobre la calota, 188 (mm del diámetro anteroposterior), 146 (mm del diámetro transverso) y 15 mm del máximo espesor óseo y 5 mm del mínimo.  

Figura 1. Registro sobre el ladrón Giovanni Palazzoli. Fuente: Mazzo 23, 477, “Registro dei Pezzi del Gabinetto antropologico psichiatrico nel Civico Ospitale Maggiore di Pavia I”. 1864-1866. Pavia. Archivio del Museo Lombroso, Università di Torino

Por su parte, la Figura 2 muestra dos tablas realizadas por Lombroso en las últimas páginas de libro de registros de su gabinete antropológico, realizado entre los años 1864 y 1866. En la primera tabla hay datos sobre los soldados fallecidos en el Hospital de Pavía, con -de izquierda a derecha- el apellido (a veces precedido por el número asignado en el mismo libro de registros), la estatura tomada sobre el cadáver, la región de origen del soldado (solo se indicaron para Nápoles y Sicilia), pesaje en [semillas de] mijo, peso del cráneo y peso del cerebro. En la segunda tabla hay datos de siete ladrones (número, apellido, peso en mijo y peso del cráneo (Nótese que el anteúltimo caso corresponde a Palazzoli).

Figura 2. Mediciones tomadas sobre los cráneos de soldados (arriba) y ladrones (abajo). Fuente: Mazzo 23, 477, “Registro dei Pezzi del Gabinetto antropologico psichiatrico nel Civico Ospitale Maggiore di Pavia I”. 1864-1866. Pavia. Archivio del Museo Lombroso, Università di Torino

Durante la segunda mitad del siglo XIX la medición del cerebro era un asunto prioritario para los antropólogos, pero no había demasiado consenso sobre el modo de hacerlo; si a través de su peso, sus longitudes, de la capacidad craneana o de las dimensiones externas del cráneo (Topinard 1885). Había consenso, en cambio, en cuanto a que todas esas medidas tenían algún grado de asociación directa; es decir, personas más altas tendían a tener cráneos más grandes y, a su vez, cerebros más grandes. Medir el cerebro, cuando era posible, comportaba algunos problemas metodológicos (extracción de la sangre, de las membranas, etc.); además, de que dicho órgano era sensible a las mismas condiciones que provocaban la muerte (e.g., enfermedades y desnutrición) y a los métodos de conservación aplicados. Tomar medidas internas o externas del cráneo, en lugar del cerebro, era entonces una solución práctica.

La capacidad craneana podía medirse incorporando líquidos o sólidos (arena, plomo, semillas de mijo o mostaza, entre otros), a través del foramen magnum, de los que luego se calculaba el volumen o peso; pero era una medida de difícil acceso y la diferencia arrojada por distintos materiales, o entre distintos observadores, opacaba cualquier inferencia. En tanto, la medición de curvas, diámetros o circunferencias era sencilla y requería de pocos instrumentos y entrenamiento. Dichas mediciones, sin embargo, incorporaban también los huesos que podían ser espesos y voluminosos, lo que conducía a sobreestimar el tamaño de la cavidad.

Lombroso tomó numerosas medidas craneanas, pero decidió finalmente medir la capacidad con arena (en centímetros cúbicos). Insistía a lo largo de sus obras (Lombroso 1876, 1878 1883) en que la mayoría de los delincuentes tenían capacidades craneanas bajas (y cráneos pesados) a pesar de que -destacaba, para fortalecer sus conclusiones- la arena arrojaba valores superiores a otros elementos y de que los criminales presentaban estaturas superiores a los normales (Lombroso 1883). Es probable entonces que los pesajes de las semillas de mijo y los cráneos (Figura 2) no hayan sido más que ensayos estadísticos para evaluar diferencias en los delincuentes, diferencias entre métodos, o correspondencias entre distintos indicadores; lo que constituiría, entonces, una búsqueda para dar validez a sus conclusiones y hacerlas comparables a las de otros investigadores.

Referencias bibliográficas

Lombroso, C. 1876. L’uomo delinquente studiato in rapporto alla antropologia, alla medicina legale ed alle discipline carcerarie pel Prof. Cesare Lombroso, Ulrico Hoepli, Milano.

Lombroso, C. 1878. Cranio, in Enciclopedia medica italiana diretta per le singole specialità dai dottori Albertini [et al], F. Vallardi, Milano, vol. 2.

Lombroso, C. 1883. Capacità cranica di 121 criminali. Archivio di Psichiatria, Scienze Penali ed Antropologia Criminale per Servire allo Studio dell’Uomo Alienato e Delinquente» IV, pp. 215-219.

Lombroso, C. 1896. L’uomo delinquente studiato in rapporto alla antropologia, alla medicina legale ed alle discipline carcerarie, 5ta ed. Fratelli Bocca Editori, Torino.

Topinard, P. 1885. Éléments d’Anthropologie Générale. Adrien Delahaye et Émile Lecrosnier Éditeurs, Paris.

Measurements and statistics in Cesare Lombroso’s archives

By Marina Laura Sardi, Universidad Nacional de La Plata

In order to decipher whether the criminal differed from the sane or the alienated man, Cesare Lombroso compared bodies, faces and skulls. This was possible, in part, because between 1864 and 1876, when he taught the clinic of mental illness at the Pavia hospital, Italy, he organized a collection of skulls, brains and facial masks of deceased persons. This collection included few criminals and, instead, a larger number of mentally ill people, as well as some soldiers who constituted a reference of honest people to compare the criminals. Along with these materials, different doctors kept record books with biographical data (name, age, place of origin, illness, etc.), anthropometric characteristics (height, weight, hairiness, presence of tattoos, etc.) and the characteristics of the organs (brain, heart, lungs, spleen, kidneys, etc.) removed during dissection.

In those years, anthropology was seeking to standardize its practices. This involved the selection of anatomical structures from which certain indicators could be read, the determination of appropriate measurements and, sometimes, the provision of instruments to measure them. Different researchers, in their own laboratories, were engaged in this quest and it would take several more years of discussions to reach some consensus.

The method of criminal anthropology, of which Lombroso was one of the main proponents, consisted of taking measurements used by physical anthropologists to differentiate races. It also consisted of the observation of “cranial anomalies”, which would predominate in criminals (Lombroso 1876, 1878, 1896), such as the presence of medial frontal suture and median occipital fossa, developed superciliary arches and frontal sinus, hollow forehead, heavy skulls, wormian bones, cranial asymmetry, and plagiocephaly, among others. However, Lombroso could normalize a method of observation and comparison after he had reviewed the old records and revised his collection of skulls.

In the archives of the Museum of Criminal Anthropology “Cesare Lombroso” (Turin, Italy) it is possible to detect some names, handwritings, strokes, marginal annotations, crossings out, counts, and mathematical calculations through which the Italian doctor constructed the indicators and the empirical corpus that allowed him to build his inferences about the relationship between the physical body and criminality. Figure 1 shows an example of the records drawn up at Pavia Hospital, numbered 162 (mask) and 163 (skull), which indicate: “Palazzoli Giovanni, 40 years old. Thief who died in February 1866 […] A tall individual, 1.70 m tall, black hair, well nourished, with a notable development of corpulence and genital organs […] Signs of tattoos. P.S. on the right arm is depicted a postillion, on the left arm a naked woman dancing on a rope […]’, a drawing of which is attached to the text. This is followed by a description of the cause of death (tuberculosis) and the characteristics of certain organs, such as “hypertrophy of the heart”. In this register, one can see the traces made in red by Lombroso of physical characteristics which, according to him, would be more frequent or more pronounced in criminals. Other annotations in blue indicate the weight of the brain, 1310 (gr), and measurements on the calotte, 188 (mm of the anteroposterior diameter), 146 (mm of the transverse diameter) and 15 mm of the maximum bone thickness and 5 mm of the minimum.

Figura 1. Record about the thief Giovanni Palazzoli. Source: Mazzo 23, 477, “Registro dei Pezzi del Gabinetto antropologico psichiatrico nel Civico Ospitale Maggiore di Pavia I”. 1864-1866. Pavia. Archivio del Museo Lombroso, Università di Torino.

Figure 2 shows two tables made by Lombroso in the last pages of the record book of his anthropological cabinet, made between 1864 and 1866. In the first table, there are data taken on the soldiers who died in the Pavia Hospital, including – from left to right – the surname (sometimes preceded by the number assigned in the same record book), the height taken on the corpse, the region of origin of the soldier (only indicated for Naples and Sicily), weight in [seeds of] millet, the weight of the skull and the weight of the brain. In the second table, there are data for seven thieves (number, surname, weight in millet, and weight of the skull (note that the last but one case corresponds to Palazzoli).

Figura 2. Measurements taken on the soldiers (above) and thieves’ skulls (below). Source: Mazzo 23, 477, “Registro dei Pezzi del Gabinetto antropologico psichiatrico nel Civico Ospitale Maggiore di Pavia I”. 1864-1866. Pavia. Archivio del Museo Lombroso, Università di Torino.

During the second half of the 19th century, the measurement of the brain was a priority issue for anthropologists, but there was little consensus on how to do this; whether through weight, lengths, cranial capacity, or the external dimensions of the skull (Topinard 1885). There was consensus, however, that all these measures had some degree of direct association; that is, taller people tended to have larger skulls and, in turn, larger brains. Measuring the brain, where possible, entailed some methodological problems (removal of blood, membranes, etc.); in addition, the brain was sensitive to the same conditions that caused death (e.g., disease and malnutrition) and to the preservation methods applied. Taking internal or external measurements of the skull, rather than the brain, was then a practical solution.

Cranial capacity could be measured by incorporating liquids or solids (sand, lead, millet, or mustard seeds, among others) through the foramen magnum, from which the volume or weight was then calculated; but it was difficult to get direct access to the cavity and the differences yielded using different materials or between different observers obscured any inference. Meanwhile, the measurement of curves, diameters, or circumferences was simple and required few instruments and training. Such measurements, however, also incorporated bones, which could be thick and bulky, leading to an overestimation of the size of the cavity.

Lombroso took numerous cranial measurements but finally decided to measure capacity with sand (in cubic centimeters). He insisted throughout his works (Lombroso 1876, 1878 1883) that most criminals had low cranial capacities (and heavy skulls) despite the fact that – to strengthen his conclusions – sand yielded higher values than other elements, and that criminals had larger than normal statures (Lombroso 1883). It is likely, then, that the weighing of millet seeds and skulls (Figure 2) were nothing more than statistical tests to evaluate differences in criminals, differences between methods, or correspondences between different indicators; which would constitute, thus, a quest to validate his conclusions and make them comparable to those of other researchers.

Bibliographic references

Lombroso, C. 1876. L’uomo delinquente studiato in rapporto alla antropologia, alla medicina legale ed alle discipline carcerarie pel Prof. Cesare Lombroso, Ulrico Hoepli, Milano.

Lombroso, C. 1878. Cranio, in Enciclopedia medica italiana diretta per le singole specialità dai dottori Albertini [et al], F. Vallardi, Milano, vol. 2.

Lombroso, C. 1883. Capacità cranica di 121 criminali. Archivio di Psichiatria, Scienze Penali ed Antropologia Criminale per Servire allo Studio dell’Uomo Alienato e Delinquente» IV, pp. 215-219.

Lombroso, C. 1896. L’uomo delinquente studiato in rapporto alla antropologia, alla medicina legale ed alle discipline carcerarie, 5ta ed. Fratelli Bocca Editori, Torino.

Topinard, P. 1885. Éléments d’Anthropologie Générale. Adrien Delahaye et Émile Lecrosnier Éditeurs, Paris.

First SciCoMove secondments to La Plata (November-December 2021)

Nathalie Richard (Le Mans University), and Silvano Montaldo (Lombroso Museum, University of Turin) are now in La Plata.

Cast Skeleton of Diplodocus Carnegii, Museo De La Plata, Argentina (photograph by S. Montaldo).

Silvano Montaldo is working, with the help of the anthropology and Museum Archive teams at La Plata, on the circulation of Cesare Lombroso’s ideas on physical anthropology and criminology in Argentina (case study). He discovered some interesting archives in the La Plata Police Museum. This museum keeps the archives of Juan Vucetich, who devised a system of fingerprint identification in the 1890’s, and was in contact with Lombroso.

Nathalie Richard is working with the La Plata Museum team and the team at the Museum Archive, on communication and dissemination. She helps planning the training session on “archives and collections”, designed for PhD students (July 4-8 2022). Together with the La Plata teams, she is selecting interesting specimens and archive files, attesting to the circulation of collections between Europe and Argentina, which could be included in the mooc and the digital exhibition.

Collections of the “Cesare Lombroso” Museum of Criminal Anthropology

By Cristina Cilli, University of Turin, Italy

Cesare Lombroso positivism was expressed as extreme attention to statistics, the accumulation of documentary evidences, and application of the scientific method to existing disciplines or those he helped establish, with special attention to deviance: psychiatry, criminal anthropology, sociology of the genius, the madman and the criminal, (presumed) paranormal phenomena.

The Main Room of the Museum

The Museum today houses important collections concerning the study of crime and criminals, of insanity and the insane. Lombroso collected a rich series of objects made in prison and in the insane asylum. In addition, he collected an extensive documentation of the physiognomy of criminals and the insane, inspired by a widespread European tradition.

The museum displays numerous human remains collected and studied by Lombroso and his students, including a rich collection of more than 700 skulls: murders skull “presents the maximum of criminal traits”, i.e. “narrow forehead, enormous frontal sinuses, orbits, mandible and zygomata, asymmetry of the face, of the nose, of the orbits…”. To finalize the theorem, the fossa identified on the skull of the “brigand Villella” was proof of the fact that cranial anomalies reflect cerebral anomalies and primitive biological traits. The collection of comparative anatomy tends to show the presence of the brigand Villella’s cranial anomaly in mammals evolutionarily distant from man.

Death masks: 30 wax death masks reproducing the faces of criminals who died in prison were given to Lombroso by Lorenzo Tenchini, professor of Anatomy at the University of Parma. The masks were made in the 1880s and 90s as a personal gallery of anatomical, physiognomic and anthropometric aspects typical of criminals. Other 30 death masks are in plaster.

Giuseppe Villella’s Skull Room and showcases with clothes made by insane person

Material evidence: for Lombroso the material evidence of crime consisted not only of “things” but also of “signs.” The material evidence tells something, or a lot, about the criminal man. Illuminating the crime scene, it demonstrates the modus operandi and motives of the criminal, also providing indications about the criminal’s full or partial liability to punishment. The Museum houses more then 350 material evidences like knifes, daggers, picklocks, blunt objects, ropes, etc…

Lombroso views tattoos as an indicator of criminality, which he would later closely relate to “atavism”: it would be this regression toward primitive biological forms that drives criminals to indelibly engrave designs, symbols and writings on their bodies. Tattoos collection is composed by drawings on paper (about 150), pieces of skins, photographs (about 100) represent one of the richest and most important collection of the second half of the 19th century.

Collection of artistic manufacturing made by insane people (outsider art or “art brut”). Lombroso was interested in the artistic expressions of mentally disabled persons: if the rather mad person preserves the appearance of genius, albeit deprived of substance, the lunatic will connect us to the substance, albeit formally inadequate substance, of genius: drawings on paper (more than 200), furniture, pipes, sculptures in wood, object in paper, clothes, etc.

The collection of more than 80 water pitchers, engraved with writing and drawings by prisoners in Turin’s “Le Nuove” Prison represents a unique collection of all the world as well as the clay sculptures. The model of the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia (USA) and 6 models of cells coming from several European prisons complete the collection concerning the places of imprisonment.

Finally the historical Archive of the Museum preserves a fund of over than 6000 photographs, about 1900 Lombroso’s professional and personal letters, documentations of his activities of research, more than 500 writings from insane people and prisoners. The majority of this documentation is digitalized.