Reanalysis of local variations in the Ainu crania

Abstract

Local variations of the recent Ainu crania and their affinities to neighboring populations, both recent and prehistoric, were reanalyzed using multivariate statistical methods. Local variations in recent Ainu are apparent between the groups in northeastern and the other areas of Hokkaido. There is an evidence that the former group may have been influenced genetically to a certain extent by the Northeast Asian populations who adapted to extremely cold climate. However, they still largely retain the characteristics derived from the indigenous populations in Hokkaido. It was reconfirmed that Ainu has, as a whole, descended directly from the prehistoric populations of the Jomon age through those of the epi-Jomon age in Hokkaido. Hypothesis of the Northeast Asian origin of Ainu that has been proposed by some geneticists is hardly acceptable from the morphological point of view. Discrepancies between morphological and genetic evidence should be examined thoroughly on the basis of more reliable data and methods.