Encyclopedia, Difference between revisions of "Aleš Hrdlička" - New World

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In the world related to physical anthropology Hrdlicka was definitely an authoritative voice. He greatly contributed toward our understanding of the prehistory of man in [[Europe]], Asia, and America. His theory remains accepted and supported by modern data. Hrdlicka was one of the first scientists to propose the common origin of all the races. He was also one of the first to hypothesize how the races spread across the globe, and the origins of American people. His theory of the migration of Native Americans from [[Siberia]] to Alaska won him an international reputation. In many respects Hrdlicka can be considered the father of physical anthropology in the United States, and one of the greatest contributors to the development of anthropology in the world.
 
In the world related to physical anthropology Hrdlicka was definitely an authoritative voice. He greatly contributed toward our understanding of the prehistory of man in [[Europe]], Asia, and America. His theory remains accepted and supported by modern data. Hrdlicka was one of the first scientists to propose the common origin of all the races. He was also one of the first to hypothesize how the races spread across the globe, and the origins of American people. His theory of the migration of Native Americans from [[Siberia]] to Alaska won him an international reputation. In many respects Hrdlicka can be considered the father of physical anthropology in the United States, and one of the greatest contributors to the development of anthropology in the world.
  
Hrdlicka remains remembered both in the United States and in Europe. In [[Second_World_War|World War II]] the United States liberty ship ''SS Ales Hrdlicka'' was named in his honor. Numerous museums in the Czech Republic carry Hrdlicka's name, one of the most famous os which is in Prague – the Hrdlicka Museum of Man.
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Hrdlicka remains remembered both in the United States and in Europe. In [[Second_World_War|World War II]] the United States liberty ship ''SS Ales Hrdlicka'' was named in his honor. Numerous museums in the Czech Republic carry Hrdlicka's name, one of the most famous of which is in Prague – the Hrdlicka Museum of Man.
  
 
== Bibliography ==
 
== Bibliography ==

Revision as of 01:21, 3 February 2006


Aleš Hrdlička (born March 30, 1869 – died September 5, 1943) was an important figure in the development of anthropology, especially physical anthropology, in the United States. His extensive writings not only catalogued his findings, but also provided physical evidence in support of his thesis that Native American people came from Asia, across the Bering Strait. He had no understanding of genetics, or of the future contribution it would make to his field, gathering his evidence from an intensive study of bones. Nevertheless, he was one of the first scientists to propose that all races had a common origin in the Old World.

Life

Ales Hrdlicka was born in Humpolec, Bohemia (today's Czech Republic) into a family of cabinet-makers. He spent his childhood in his native city where he finished elementary and middle school. When he was thirteen his family emigrated to the USA, and settled in New York. Ales worked together with his father in the tobacco factory until he was 19. In 1888 he fell seriously ill with typhoid fever, and so he met his physician, Dr. M. Rosenblueth, a former rabbi, who changed Hrdlicka's life forever. Upon recovery, and with the help of Dr. Rosenblueth, Hrdlicka entered and graduated from the Eclectic Medical College of the City of New York. In 1894 he received a research position in the new State Homeopathic Hospital for the Insane, at Middletown, New York. Here he developed his interest in anthropometry, the study of measuring the human body, which he further specialized in Paris, under Leon Manouvrier. Upon his return to New York in 1896 Hrdlicka married Marie S. Dieudonnee. The marriage was childless and she died in 1918. Hrdlicka married again in 1920, again with no children.

In 1898 Hrdlicka visited Mexico to begin his research on the indigenous people: the Tarahumares, the Huichols, and the Tephuanes. In 1903 the new department of Physical Anthropology was opened at the National Museum in Washington (today's Smithsonian. Ales Hrdlicka became the first curator of the department, a post he held until his retirement in 1941. Hrdlicka founded the American Journal of Physical Anthropology in 1918, and in 1928, following his initiative, the American Association of Physical Anthropologists was organized and established. He was a significant contributor to the development of physical anthropology in Czechoslovakia, where under the “Ales and Marie Hrdlicka Foundation” he established the Chair in Anthropology at the Charles University in Prague.

Ales Hrdlicka died in Washington, D.C., on September 5, 1943.

Work

Ales Hrdlicka is definitely one of the most fruitful scholars in the history of anthropology. Since his graduation from the New York Homeopathic Medical College in 1894 he produced, without a break, an average of eight papers every year until his death. All together there are more than 350 items in his bibliography. Hrdlicka’s restless spirit and the desire for discovery brought him to compile one of the most complete collections of human bone material in the world. His collection of craniological material is described in detail in six-volume Catalogues of Human Crania in the U. S. National Museum (1924, 1925, 1927, 1928, 1931, 1942).

With his appointment to the National Museum in 1903 started the phase in Hrdlicka’s life that he is the most famous for – physical anthropology. He studied the origin and evolution of the human species in general, and particularly the problem of the origin of Native Americans. In the period from 1910 to 1924, Hrdlicka conducted numerous studies on over 1000 subjects to support his idea of the origin of American people. In his books Physical Anthropology (1919), followed by Anthropometry (1920) and Old Americans (1925), Hrdlicka claimed that the first Americans immigrated across the Bering Strait from the Asian continent. His proposal was based on the fact that in the Americas there were no apes from which man could evolve. Hrdlicka organized several expeditions to Alaska, Kodiak Island, Aleutian Islands, and the Commander Islands to collect evidence to support his idea.

According to Hrdlicka, all the races had a common origin – in the Old World – and had spread gradually across the globe. In 1927 Hrdlicka published his article The Neanderthal Phase of Man where he elaborated on this thesis. Hrdlicka’s devotion to physical anthropology culminated in 1918 with his founding of the American Journal of Physical Anthropology, which he edited until his retirement in 1942.

Legacy

In the world related to physical anthropology Hrdlicka was definitely an authoritative voice. He greatly contributed toward our understanding of the prehistory of man in Europe, Asia, and America. His theory remains accepted and supported by modern data. Hrdlicka was one of the first scientists to propose the common origin of all the races. He was also one of the first to hypothesize how the races spread across the globe, and the origins of American people. His theory of the migration of Native Americans from Siberia to Alaska won him an international reputation. In many respects Hrdlicka can be considered the father of physical anthropology in the United States, and one of the greatest contributors to the development of anthropology in the world.

Hrdlicka remains remembered both in the United States and in Europe. In World War II the United States liberty ship SS Ales Hrdlicka was named in his honor. Numerous museums in the Czech Republic carry Hrdlicka's name, one of the most famous of which is in Prague – the Hrdlicka Museum of Man.

Bibliography

  • Hrdlicka A (1904) Directions for collecting information and specimens for physical anthropology. Washington, DC: Govt. print. off.
  • Hrdlicka A (1905) Brain weight in vertebrates. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1906a) Brains and brain preservatives. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
  • Hrdlicka A (1906b) Contribution to the physical anthropology of California: based on collections in the Department of anthropology of the University of California and in the U.S. National museum. Berkeley: The University Press.
  • Hrdlicka A (1907) Skeletal remains suggesting or attributed to early man in North America. Washington, DC: Govt. print. off. ISBN 0781240336
  • Hrdlicka A (1908) Physiological and medical observations among the Indians of Southwestern United States and Northern Mexico. Washington, DC: Govt Print Off.
  • Hrdlicka A (1909) Tuberculosis among certain Indian tribes of the United States. Washington, DC: Govt. Print. Off. ISBN 0781240425
  • Hrdlicka A (1910) Contribution to the anthropology of central and Smith sound Eskimo. New York, NY: The Trustees.
  • Hrdlicka A (1911) Some results of recent anthropological exploration in Peru (with four plates). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1912a) Medical and anthropological publications. n.p.
  • Hrdlicka A (1912b) The natives of Kharga Oasis, Egypt. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1912c) Remains in eastern Asia of the race that peopled America (with three plates). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1912d) Early Man In South America (Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletins). Reprint Services Corp. ISBN 0781240522
  • Hrdlicka A (1914) Anthropological work in Peru, in 1913, with notes on the pathology of the ancient Peruvians (with twenty-six plates). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1916a) The most ancient skeletal remains of man. Washington, DC: Govt. Print. Off.
  • Hrdlicka A (1916b) Physical anthropology of the Lenape or Delawares, and of the eastern Indians in general. New York, NY: The Museum of the American Indian, Heye foundation. ISBN 078124062X
  • Hrdlicka A (1918) Recent discoveries attributed to early man in America. Washington, DC: Govt. print. off. ISBN 0781240662
  • Hrdlicka A (1919a) Physical anthropology; its scope and aims; its history and present status in the United States. Philadelphia, PA: The Wistar institute of anatomy and biology.
  • Hrdlicka A (1919b) The races of Russia (with 1 map). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1920) Anthropometry. Philadelphia, PA: The Wistar institute of anatomy and biology.
  • Hrdlicka A (1922) The anthropology of Florida. Deland, FL: The Society.
  • Hrdlicka A (1924) Catalogue of human crania in the United States National Museum collections. Washington, DC: Govt. Print. Off.
  • Hrdlicka A (1925a) The Old Americans. Baltimore, MD: The Williams & Wilkins Company.
  • Hrdlicka A (1925b) The origin and antiquity of the American Indian. Washington, DC: G.P.O.
  • Hrdlicka A (1927a) Anthropology of the American Negro : historical notes. Philadelphia, PA: Wistar Institute Press.
  • Hrdlicka A (1927b) The Neanderthal phase of man. London: Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland.
  • Hrdlicka A (1929) Bibliography of Dr. Ales Hrdlicka [1892-1928]. Prague: Imp. V. & A. Janata, N. Bydzov.
  • Hrdlicka A (1930a) Anthropological survey in Alaska. Washington, DC.
  • Hrdlicka A (1930b) The skeletal remains of early man. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1931) Children who run on all fours, and other animal-like behaviors in the human child. New York, NY: Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc.
  • Hrdlicka A (1934) The hypotrochanteric fossa of the femur (with 14 plates). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1935a) Ear exostoses (with five plates). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1935b) Melanesians and Australians and the peopling of America. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution. ISBN 0781243378
  • Hrdlicka A (1937) Biographical memoir of George Sumner Huntington, 1861-1927. Washington, DC: The National Academy of Sciences.
  • Hrdlicka A (1939) Practical anthropometry. Philadelphia, PA: Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology. ISBN 0404033725
  • Hrdlicka A (1940a) Observations and measurements on the members of the National academy of sciences. Washington, DC: U.S. Govt. print. off.
  • Hrdlicka A (1940b) Ritual ablation of front teeth in Siberia and America (with five plates). Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1941a) Diseases of and artifacts on skulls and bones from Kodiak island. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1941b) Exploration of mummy caves in the Aleutian Islands. Lancaster, PA: The Science Press.
  • Hrdlicka A (1942a) Catalog of human crania in the United States National Museum collections: Eskimo in general. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1942b) The peoples of the Soviet Union. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Hrdlicka A (1943) Alaska diary, 1926-1931. Lancaster, PA: The Jaques Cattell press.
  • Hrdlicka A (1944a) The anthropology of Kodiak island. Philadelphia, PA: The Wistar institute of anatomy and biology. ISBN 0404116531
  • Hrdlicka A (1944b) Catalog of human crania in the United States National Museum collections. Non-Eskimo people of the northwest coast, Alaska, and Siberia. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, United States National Museum.
  • Hrdlicka A (1970) Contribution to the physical anthropology of California. Berkeley: The University Press.
  • Hrdlicka A (1989) The Aleutian and Commander islands and their inhabitants. Philadelphia, PA: Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology.
  • Hrdlicka A, Fenner CN, Wright FE, Holmes WH, and Willis B (1912) Early man in South America. Washington, DC: G. P. O.
  • Hrdlicka A, Merbs C.F, Christensen N.R, Tyson R.A, and Alcauskas, E.S.D (1980) Catalogue of the Hrdlicka paleopathology collection. San Diego, CA: San Diego Museum of Man.


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