Proto-Mongoloid is an outdated racial classification of human beings based on a now-disproven theory of biological race. In

anthropological Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...

theories of the 19th and 20th centuries, proto-Mongoloids were seen as the ancestors of the

Mongoloid race Mongoloid () is an obsolete racial grouping of various peoples indigenous to large parts of Asia, the Americas, and some regions in Europe and Oceania. The term is derived from a now-disproven theory of biological race. In the past, other terms ...

. Notable examples of fossils that were formerly thought to belong to the proto-Mongoloid group are found in Late Pleistocene (

Upper Paleolithic The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...

) fossils, notably the Minatogawa skeletons and the

Liujiang Liujiang District (; Standard Zhuang: ) is under the administration of Liuzhou, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, located on the southwest bank of the Liu River. It covers a land area of and had a population of 562,351 . The southernmost co ...

crania.Matt Cartmill, Fred H. Smith, ''The Human Lineage'', John Wiley & Sons (2009)
p. 449
The Jōmon people of Japan, Southeast Asians,

Pacific islanders Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/ racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of Oce ...

, and Native Americans were thought to be most closely related to the proto-Mongoloid group.

Morphological characteristics

While the Jōmon are relatively short, and have finely chiseled features, most times double

eyelid An eyelid is a thin fold of skin that covers and protects an eye. The levator palpebrae superioris muscle retracts the eyelid, exposing the cornea to the outside, giving vision. This can be either voluntarily or involuntarily. The human eye ...

s, much body hair and often wavy hair which resemble pseudo-Caucasoid traits, the Proto-Mongoloids were often described as "straight-haired type, medium in complexion, jaw protrusion, nose-breadth, and inclining probably to round-headedness". Professor of anthropology, at the International Research Center for Japanese Studies,

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin, Keihanshin metropolitan area along wi ...

, said that there were Neo-Mongoloids and Paleo-Mongoloids. Akazawa said Neo-Mongoloids have "extreme Mongoloid, cold-adapted features" and they included the

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

, Buryats, Eskimo and Chukchi. In contrast, Akazawa said Paleo-Mongoloids are less cold-adapted. He said Burmese,

Filipinos Filipinos ( tl, Mga Pilipino) are the people who are citizens of or native to the Philippines. The majority of Filipinos today come from various Austronesian ethnolinguistic groups, all typically speaking either Filipino, English and/or othe ...

, Polynesians, Jōmon and the

indigenous peoples of the Americas The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples. Many Indigenous peoples of the A ...

were Paleo-Mongoloid.Takeru Akazawa and Emóke J.E. Sathmåry. Prehistoric Mongoloid dispersals. New York, Oxford University Press, 1996.

References

{{reflist Indigenous peoples of East Asia Peopling of East Asia Peopling of Southeast Asia Archaeogenetic lineages