Physical Anthropology of Portuguese Visigoths

Physical Anthropology of Portuguese Visigoths

The anthropological study of human remains from the visigothic necropolis [DP: 7th c. AD] in Silveirona, on the outskirts of Estremoz, allowed us to obtain the median stature of around fifty adult individuals, both male and female, as being of 1.65m and 1.53m, respectively. Identical work, using the same methodology, presented 1.68m and 1.57m for adult males and females found in necropolae dating from the same period located in Alcoitão and Abuxarda, in the concelho (municipality) of Cascais (Cunha, 1958-59, p.42). The observed statures are, on average, inferior to those of the modern Portuguese population.
The cranial characteristics of the Silveirona skeletons are very similar to those of the modern Portuguese, displaying however a greater degree of dolicocephalism. This aspect, the observed statures, as well as the parallells with necropolae excavated in Spain allowed A. Xavier da Cunha (1958-59, p.42, 47) to conclude, following earlier observations made by J. de Barros e Cunha (1940, 692), that there exists racial continuity from the period in question, despite nordic or center-european influences, the populations in question not being visigothic in the strict sense but rather "visigothized".
The anthropoligical study of the material at the Segóbriga necropolis indicated, similarly, the preponderance of the mediterranean gracile type. (Almagro, 1975, p.132).
(translation courtesy of Silveira)
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