{{short description|Form of body alteration}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2025}} {{Infobox anatomy | name = Artificial cranial deformation | image = Afrasiab, elongated skull 600-800 CE, Afrasiab Museum.jpg | image_size = 200px | alt = Photograph of an elongated human skull displayed at the Afrasiab Museum, Samarkand | caption = Elongated skull excavated in [[Samarkand]] (600–800 CE), [[Afrasiab Museum of Samarkand]] | system = [[Skeletal system]] | location = [[Skull]] | synonyms = Head binding, head flattening, head shaping }} [[File:Kalchayan Prince profile.jpg|thumb|upright|Portrait of a [[Yuezhi]] prince from [[Khalchayan]], circa 1st century CE, showing elongated skull.]] '''Artificial cranial deformation''' or '''modification''', '''head flattening''', or '''head binding''' is a form of [[body alteration]] in which the [[human skull|skull]] of a human being is deformed intentionally. It is done by distorting the normal growth of a child's skull by applying pressure. Flat shapes, elongated ones (produced by binding between two pieces of [[wood]]), rounded ones (binding in [[cloth]]), and [[cone|conical]] ones are among those chosen or valued in various cultures.

Typically, the alteration is carried out on an [[infant]], when the skull is most pliable. In a typical case, head binding begins approximately a month after birth and continues for about six months.

==History== [[File:Khingila portrait (young).jpg|thumb|upright|Portrait of [[Alchon Huns|Alchon Hun]] king [[Khingila]], from his coinage, {{circa|450&nbsp;CE}}]] Intentional cranial deformation predates [[written history]]; it was practiced commonly in a number of cultures that are widely separated geographically and chronologically, and still occurs today in a few areas, including [[Vanuatu]].<ref>{{cite news |last=Taipale |first=Eric |title=Tracing the History and Health Impacts of Skull Modification |url=https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/tracing-the-history-and-health-impacts-of-skull-modification |work=Discover |date=28 January 2022 |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref>

The earliest suggested examples were once thought to include Neanderthals and the Proto-[[Neolithic]] ''[[Homo sapiens]]'' component (9th millennium BCE) from [[Shanidar Cave]] in [[Iraq]].<ref name="MeiklejohnSolecki92">{{cite journal |last1=Meiklejohn |first1=Christopher |last2=Agelarakis |first2=Anagnostis |last3=Akkermans |first3=Peter A. |last4=Smith |first4=Philip E. L. |last5=Solecki |first5=Rose |title=Artificial cranial deformation in the Proto-neolithic and Neolithic Near East and its possible origin: Evidence from four sites |journal=Paléorient |date=1992 |volume=18 |issue=2 |pages=83–97 |doi=10.3406/paleo.1992.4574 |url=https://www.persee.fr/doc/paleo_0153-9345_1992_num_18_2_4574 |language=fr |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref><ref name="Trinkaus1982">{{cite journal |last=Trinkaus |first=Erik |date=April 1982 |title=Artificial Cranial Deformation in the Shanidar 1 and 5 Neandertals |journal=Current Anthropology |volume=23 |issue=2 |pages=198–199 |doi=10.1086/202808 |jstor=2742361 |s2cid=144182791}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Agelarakis |first=A. |year=1993 |title=The Shanidar Cave Proto-Neolithic Human Population: Aspects of Demography and Paleopathology |journal=Human Evolution |volume=8 |issue=4 |pages=235–253 |doi=10.1007/BF02438114 |s2cid=85239949}}</ref> The view that the Neanderthal skull was artificially deformed was common for a period. However, later research by Chech, Grove, Thorne, and Trinkaus, based on new cranial reconstructions in 1999, questioned the earlier findings and concluded: "we no longer consider that artificial cranial deformation can be inferred for the specimen".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Chech |first1=Mario |last2=Groves |first2=Colin P. |last3=Thorne |first3=Alan |last4=Trinkaus |first4=Erik |title=A New Reconstruction of the Shanidar 5 Cranium |journal=Paléorient |date=1999 |volume=25 |issue=2 |pages=143–146 |doi=10.3406/paleo.1999.4692 |jstor=41496548}}</ref> It is thought elongated skulls found among Neolithic peoples in Southwest Asia were the result of artificial cranial deformation.<ref name="MeiklejohnSolecki92"/><ref>{{cite book |last=Lorentz |first=K. O. |year=2010 |chapter=Ubaid Head Shaping |editor1-last=Carter |editor1-first=R. A. |editor2-last=Philip |editor2-first=G. |title=Beyond the Ubaid: Transformation and Integration in the Late Prehistoric Societies of the Middle East |series=Oriental Institute Seminars |volume=5 |pages=125–148 |location=Chicago |publisher=Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago |isbn=978-1-885923-61-5 |url=https://oi.uchicago.edu/sites/oi.uchicago.edu/files/uploads/shared/docs/ois5.pdf |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref>

The earliest written record of cranial deformation comes from [[Hippocrates]] in about 400 BCE. He described a group known as the [[Macrocephali]] or Long-heads, who were named for their practice of cranial modification.<ref>{{cite book |last=Hippocrates |author-link=Hippocrates |date=1923 |orig-date=c. 400 BCE |title=Airs, Waters, Places |translator=W. H. S. Jones |series=Loeb Classical Library |volume=147 |location=London |publisher=Harvard University Press |pages=110–111 |doi=10.4159/DLCL.hippocrates_cos-airs_waters_places.1923 |url=https://www.loebclassics.com/view/hippocrates_cos-airs_waters_places/1923/pb_LCL147.111.xml |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref>{{efn|Alternate English translations include: * {{cite book |last=Hippocrates |author-link=Hippocrates |title=The Genuine Works of Hippocrates |translator=Francis Adams |year=1849 |location=New York |publisher=William Wood |url=https://classics.mit.edu/Hippocrates/airwatpl.14.14.html |access-date=27 April 2025}} * {{cite book |last=Hippocrates |author-link=Hippocrates |title=Hippocrates Upon Air, Water, and Situation; Upon Epidemical Diseases; and Upon Prognosticks, In Acute Cases Especially |translator=Francis Clifton |edition=2nd |year=1752 |location=London |publisher=John Whiston, Benj. White, and Lockyer Davis |pages=22–23 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LNhhAAAAcAAJ |access-date=27 April 2025}} }}

===Eurasia=== [[File:Rostam, Iranian hero, mythical king of Zabulistan. Panjikent, 7th century CE.jpg|thumb|Legendary Iranian king [[Rostam]], depicted in this 7th-century CE mural at [[Panjikent]], [[Sogdia]], with an elongated skull in the fashion of the [[Alchon Huns]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Rezakhani |first=Khodadad |title=ReOrienting the Sasanians: East Iran in Late Antiquity |date=15 March 2017 |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |isbn=978-1-4744-0030-5 |page=124 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bjRWDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA109 |language=en |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=A Silk Road Renaissance |url=https://archaeology.org/issues/online/collection/a-silk-road-renaissance/ |website=Archaeology Magazine |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite thesis |last=Kurbanov |first=Aydogdy |title=The Hephthalites: Archaeological and Historical Analysis |publisher=Freie Universität Berlin |date=2010 |page=60 |url=https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/bitstream/handle/fub188/8366/01_Text.pdf |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref>]] In the [[Old World]], the practice of cranial deformation was brought to [[Bactria]] and [[Sogdiana]] by the [[Yuezhi]], a tribe that created the [[Kushan Empire]]. Men with such skulls are depicted in various surviving sculptures and friezes of that time, such as the Kushan prince of [[Khalchayan]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Lebedynsky |first=Iaroslav |title=Les Saces |year=2006 |publisher=Editions Errance |location=Paris |isbn=978-2-87772-337-4 |page=15}}</ref> [[File:Elongated skull IMG 6686-6689.jpg|thumb|Elongated skull of a young woman, probably an [[Alans|Alan]].]]

[[Alchon Huns|Alchon]] kings are generally recognized by their elongated skulls, a result of artificial skull deformation.<ref name="HTB17">{{cite book |last=Bakker |first=Hans T. |title=The Alkhan: A Hunnic People in South Asia |date=12 March 2020 |publisher=Barkhuis |isbn=978-94-93194-00-7 |pages=17, 46 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZLnVDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA26 |language=en |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref> Archaeologist Cameron Petrie wrote that "The depictions of elongated heads suggest that the Alchon kings engaged in skull modification, which was also practised by the Hun groups that appeared in Europe." The elongated skulls appear clearly in most portraits of rulers in the coinage of the Alchon Huns, and most visibly on the coinage of [[Khingila]].<ref name="HTB17"/> These elongated skulls, which they obviously displayed with pride, distinguished them from other peoples, such as their predecessors the [[Kidarites]].<ref name="HTB17"/> On their coins, the spectacular skulls came to replace the [[Sasanian crowns]] which had been current in the region's coinage.<ref name="HTB17"/> This practice is also known among other peoples of the steppes, particularly the [[Huns]], and as far as Europe, where it was introduced by the Huns themselves.<ref name="HTB17"/><ref>{{cite journal |last=Alram |first=Michael |title=From the Sasanians to the Huns: New Numismatic Evidence from the Hindu Kush |journal=The Numismatic Chronicle |date=2014 |volume=174 |page=274 |jstor=44710198 |issn=0078-2696}}</ref>

In the [[Pontic steppe]] and the rest of Europe the [[Huns]], including the [[Proto-Bulgarians]],<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Enchev |first1=Yavor |last2=Nedelkov |first2=Grigoriy |last3=Atanassova-Timeva |first3=Nadezhda |last4=Jordanov |first4=Jordan |title=Paleoneurosurgical aspects of Proto-Bulgarian artificial skull deformations |journal=Neurosurgical Focus |volume=29 |issue=6 |year=2010 |page=E3 |doi=10.3171/2010.9.focus10193 |pmid=21121717 |publisher=Journal of Neurosurgery Publishing Group |issn=1092-0684}}</ref> are also known to have practiced similar cranial deformation,<ref>{{cite web |title=Attila und die Hunnen – Schädelrekonstruktion und Atelierfoto |website=Das Historische Museum der Pfalz |url=http://www.zum.de/Faecher/G/BW/Landeskunde/rhein/kultur/museen/speyer/ausstell/hunnen/hunnin.htm |language=de |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref> as were the [[Alans]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Bachrach |first=Bernard S. |title=A History of the Alans in the West: From Their First Appearance in the Sources of Classical Antiquity Through the Early Middle Ages |year=1973 |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |location=Minneapolis |pages=67–69}}</ref>

In [[Late Antiquity]] (300–600&nbsp;CE), the [[Germanic peoples|East Germanic tribes]] who were ruled by the Huns—the [[Gepids]], [[Ostrogoths]], [[Heruli]], [[Rugii]], and [[Burgundians]]—adopted this custom. Among the [[Lombards]], the Burgundians, and the [[Thuringians]],<ref>{{cite book |last=Schutz |first=Herbert |title=The Germanic Realms in Pre-Carolingian Central Europe, 400–750 |year=2000 |publisher=Peter Lang |page=62 |isbn=978-0-8204-4965-4}}</ref> this custom seems to have comprised women only.<ref>{{cite book |last=Görman |first=Marianne |editor1-last=Ahlbäck |editor1-first=Tore |title=The Problem of Ritual: Based on Papers Read at the Symposium on Religious Rites Held at Åbo, Finland, on the 13th–16th of August 1991 |year=1993 |publisher=Almqvist & Wiksell Donner Institute |location=Stockholm |isbn=978-951-650-196-6 |page=279 |chapter=Influences from the Huns on Scandinavian Sacrificial Customs during 300–500 AD |chapter-url=https://www.doria.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/134166/The%20Problem%20of%20Ritual%201993%20OCR.pdf?sequence=2}}</ref>

In western Germanic tribes, artificial skull deformations have rarely been found.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Pany |first1=Doris |last2=Wiltschke-Schrotta |first2=Karin |title=Artificial cranial deformation in a migration period burial of Schwarzenbach, Lower Austria |journal=ViaVIAS |issue=2 |pages=18–23 |location=Vienna |publisher=Vienna Institute for Archaeological Science}}</ref>

<gallery widths="200px" heights="200px"> File:Elongated skull Hungarian national Museum 3.jpg|Female skull found in Mozs, Hungary, c. 5th century File:0511 Turmschädel Württembergisches Landesmuseum Stuttgart anagoria.JPG|Elongated skull, early 6th-century [[:Alemanni|Alemannic]] culture, [[Landesmuseum Württemberg]] File:Afrosiab, Deformed skulls 600-800 CE.jpg|Elongated skulls from [[Afrasiyab (Samarkand)|Afrasiab]], [[Samarkand]], [[Sogdia]], 600–800&nbsp;CE </gallery>

Elongated skulls of three women have been discovered among [[Viking Age|Viking]]-era burials during the eleventh century at [[Gotland, Sweden]].<ref>{{cite web |last=Anderson |first=Sonja |title=Vikings May Have Used Body Modification as a 'Sign of Identification' |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/this-viking-trade-guilds-standard-uniform-carved-up-teeth-180984080/ |website=Smithsonian |date=8 April 2024 |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref> Researchers have interpreted them as perhaps belonging to women who were not native to the island in a culture characterized as one having extensive trading relationships.<ref>{{cite web |title=Three strange skull modifications discovered in Viking women |url=https://arkeonews.net/three-strange-skull-modifications-discovered-in-viking-women/ |website=Arkeonews |date=14 April 2024 |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref>

[[File:« déformation toulousaine » MHNT.jpg|thumb|upright|Deliberate elongation of the skull, "Toulouse deformity", France]]

The custom of binding babies' heads in Europe in the twentieth century, though dying out at the time, was still extant in France, and also found in pockets in [[western Russia]], the [[Caucasus]], and in [[Scandinavia]] among the [[Sámi people|Sámi]].<ref name="Dingwall31ch2">{{cite book |last=Dingwall |first=Eric John |title=Artificial Cranial Deformation: A Contribution to the Study of Ethnic Mutilations |year=1931 |location=London |publisher=Bale, Sons & Danielsson |pages=46–80 |url=http://www.bioanth.org/Dingwall/Dingwell.1931.Chapter.II.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140912113206/http://www.bioanth.org/Dingwall/Dingwell.1931.Chapter.II.pdf |access-date=27 April 2025|archive-date=12 September 2014 }}</ref> The reasons for the shaping of the head varied over time, from aesthetic to pseudoscientific ideas about the brain's ability to hold certain types of thought depending on its shape.<ref name="Dingwall31ch2"/> In the region of [[Toulouse]] (France), these cranial deformations persisted sporadically up until the early twentieth century.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Delaire |first1=MMJ |last2=Billet |first2=J |year=1964 |title=Considérations sur les déformations crâniennes intentionnelles |journal=Revue de Stomatologie |volume=69 |pages=535–541 |url=http://delairecephalo.fr/ARTICLES%20DELAIRE%20SUR%20ANALYSES/a67-D%C3%A9form.%20Intentionnelles.pdf}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Janot |first1=F |last2=Strazielle |first2=C |last3=Awazu Pereira |first3=Da Silva |last4=Cussenot |first4=O |year=1993 |title=Adaptation of facial architecture in the Toulouse deformity |journal=Surgical and Radiologic Anatomy |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=75–76 |doi=10.1007/BF01629867 |pmid=8488439 |s2cid=9347535}}</ref> Rather than being intentionally produced as with some earlier European cultures, Toulousian deformations seemed to have been the unwanted result of an ancient medical practice among the French peasantry known as ''bandeau'', in which a baby's head was tightly wrapped and padded to protect it from impact and accident shortly after birth. In fact, many of the early modern observers of the deformation were recorded as pitying these peasant children, whom they believed to have been lowered in intelligence due to the persistence of old European customs.<ref name="Dingwall31ch2"/>

===Americas=== In the Americas, the [[Maya civilization|Maya]],<ref>{{cite conference |url= http://www.mesoweb.com/features/tiesler/media/headshaping.pdf |title= Head Shaping and Dental Decoration Among the Ancient Maya: Archeological and Cultural Aspects |author= Tiesler, Vera (Autonomous University of Yucatan) |year= 1999 | conference= 64th Meeting of the Society of American Archaeology |location= Chicago, IL, USA |access-date= 1 August 2015 |pages= 1–6 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last= Tiesler |first= Vera |date=2012 |title= Studying cranial vault modifications in ancient Mesoamerica |journal= [[Journal of Anthropological Sciences]] |volume= 90|pages= 1–26}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last1= Tiesler|first1=Vera | first2= Ruth|last2=Benítez | name-list-style= amp |date=2001 |title= Head shaping and dental decoration: Two biocultural attributes of cultural integration and social distinction among the Ancient Maya|journal=American Journal of Physical Anthropology, Annual Meeting Supplement|volume=32|page=149}}</ref> [[Inca society|Inca]], and certain tribes of [[Native Americans in the United States|North American natives]] performed the custom. In North America, the practice was known, especially among the [[Chinookan]] tribes of the Northwest and the [[Choctaw]] of the Southeast. The [[Bitterroot Salish]], (also known as [[Flathead Indians]]) were widely believed to have engaged in this practice. The Salish themselves believe that this misconception was born because their identifying sign in the [[Plains Indian Sign Language|Coast Salish Sign Language]] involved pressing both hands to opposite sides of their heads. Other tribes, including both Southeastern tribes like the Choctaw<ref>Elliott Shaw, 2015, "Choctaw Religion," at ''Overview Of World Religions,'' Carlisle, CMA, GBR: University of Cumbria Department of Religion and Ethics, see [http://www.philtar.ac.uk/encyclopedia/nam/choctaw.html], accessed 1 August 2015.</ref><ref>Hudson, Charles (1976). ''The Southeastern Indians.'' University of Tennessee Press. p. 31.</ref> and Northwestern tribes like the [[Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation|Chehalis]] and [[Nooksack (tribe)|Nooksack Indians]], practiced head flattening by strapping the infant's head to a [[cradleboard]].{{citation needed|date=August 2015}}

The practice of cranial deformation was also practiced by the [[Lucayan people]] of the [[Bahamas]] and the [[Taínos]] of the Caribbean.<ref>{{cite journal|title=Lucayan–Taíno burials from Preacher's cave, Eleuthera, Bahamas - Schaffer |date=2010 |doi=10.1002/oa.1180 |volume=22 |journal=International Journal of Osteoarchaeology |pages=45–69|last1 = Schaffer|first1 = W. C.|last2=Carr |first2=R. S. |last3=Day |first3=J. S. |last4=Pateman |first4=M. P. }}</ref>

<gallery widths="200px" heights="200px"> File:Déformation Péruvienne MHNT Noir.jpg|[[:Nazca culture|Proto Nazca]] elongated skull, {{circa|200–100&nbsp;BCE}} File:Gulf Coast Classic Period Elongated Skull Deformed for Beauty.jpg|An elongated female human skull in Olmec and Gulf Coast Gallery, in the [[National Museum of Anthropology (Mexico)]] File:Tiwanaku Deformed Skull in the Horniman Museum.jpg|Tiwanaku skull from Bolivia, on display in the [[Horniman Museum]], London </gallery>

===Austronesia=== [[File:Butuan National Museum - flattened skulls cropped.jpg|thumb|[[Visayans|Visayan]] flattened skulls ({{lang|ceb|tinangad}}) from the Butuan [[National Museum of the Philippines|National Museum]], [[Philippines]]]] The [[Visayans]] and the [[Bikolano people]] of the central islands of the [[Philippines]] practiced flattening the foreheads (and sometimes the back of the heads) widely in the pre-colonial period, particularly in the islands of [[Samar]] and [[Tablas Island|Tablas]]. Other regions where remains with artificial cranial deformations have been found include [[Albay]], [[Butuan]], [[Marinduque]], [[Cebu]], [[Bohol]], [[Surigao (province)|Surigao]], and [[Davao Region|Davao]].<ref name="Clark">{{cite journal |last1=Clark |first1=Jamie L. |title=The Distribution and Cultural Context of Artificial Cranial Modification in the Central and Southern Philippines |journal=Asian Perspectives |date=2013 |volume=52 |issue=1 |pages=28–42 |doi=10.1353/asi.2013.0003|s2cid=53623866 |hdl=10125/38718 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> The pre-colonial [[standard of beauty]] among these groups were of broad faces and receding foreheads, with the ideal skull dimensions being of equal length and width. The devices used to achieve this include a comb-like set of thin rods known as {{lang|ceb|tangad}}, plates or tablets called {{lang|bik|sipit}}, or padded boards called {{lang|bik|saop}}. These were bound to a baby's forehead with bandages and fastened at the back.<ref name="Scott"/>

They were first recorded in 1604 by the Spanish priest Diego Bobadilla. He reported that in the central Philippines, people placed the heads of children between two boards to horizontally flatten their skulls towards the back, and that they viewed this as a mark of beauty. Other historic sources confirmed the practice, further identifying it as also being a practice done by the nobility ([[tumao]]) as a mark of social status, although whether it was restricted to nobility is still unclear.<ref name="Clark"/>

People with flattened foreheads were known as {{lang|ceb|tinangad}}. People with unmodified crania were known as {{lang|ceb|ondo}}, which literally means "packed tightly" or "overstuffed", reflecting the social attitudes towards unshaped skulls (similar to the {{lang|ceb|binatakan}} and {{lang|ceb|puraw}} distinctions in [[batok|Visayan tattooing]]). People with flattened backs of the head were known as {{lang|ceb|puyak}}, but it is unknown whether {{lang|ceb|puyak}} were intentional.<ref name="Scott">{{cite book |last1=Scott |first1=William Henry |title=Barangay: Sixteenth-century Philippine Culture and Society |date=1994 |publisher=Ateneo University Press |isbn=978-971-550-135-4 |page=22}}</ref>

Other [[body modification]] practices associated with Philippine artificial cranial deformation include [[blackened teeth|blackened]] and [[teeth filing|filed]] teeth, extensive tattooing (''[[batok]]'', which was also a mark of status and beauty), [[genital piercings]], [[circumcision]], and [[Plug (jewellery)|ear plugs]]. Similar practices have also been documented among the [[Melanau people|Melanau]] of [[Sarawak]], the [[Minahasan people|Minahasan]]s of [[Sulawesi]], and some non-Islamized groups in [[Sumatra]].<ref name="Scott"/>

[[Friedrich Ratzel]] reported in 1896 that deformation of the skull, both by flattening it behind and elongating it toward the vertex, was found in isolated instances in [[Tahiti]], [[Samoa]], [[Hawaii]], and the [[Paumotu]] group, and that it occurred most frequently on Mallicollo in the New Hebrides (today [[Malakula]], [[Vanuatu]]), where the skull was squeezed extraordinarily flat.<ref>{{cite web|author=Ratzel, Friedrich |title=The History of Mankind |publisher=MacMillan, London |date=1896 |url=http://www.inquirewithin.biz/history/american_pacific/oceania/dress-ornament.htm |access-date=4 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110706145317/http://www.inquirewithin.biz/history/american_pacific/oceania/dress-ornament.htm |archive-date=6 July 2011 }}</ref>

It was also practiced at least into the 1930s on the island of [[New Britain]] in the [[Bismarck Archipelago]] of [[Papua New Guinea]].<ref>Blackwood, Beatrice, and P. M. Danby. "A study of artificial cranial deformation in New Britain." ''The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland'' 85, no. 1/2 (1955): 173-191.</ref>

===Africa=== In Africa, the [[Mangbetu people|Mangbetu]] elongated their heads. Traditionally, babies' heads were wrapped tightly with cloth, called "Limpombo", in order to give them this distinctive appearance. The practice began dying out in the 1950s.{{citation needed|date=August 2018}}

===Japan=== On the southern Japanese island of [[Tanegashima]], from the third century to the seventh century, a group may have bound the skulls of babies to flatten the back of the skull, possibly as an expression of group identity to facilitate the trade of shell goods.<ref>Noriko Seguchi, James Frances Loftus III, Shiori Yonemoto, Mary-Margaret Murphy. Investigating intentional cranial modification: A hybridized two-dimensional/three-dimensional study of the Hirota site, Tanegashima, Japan. ''PLOS ONE''. [https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0289219 PLOS ONE Online]</ref>

===China=== Cranial deformation was also practiced in the [[Neolithic]] period at the Houtaomuga Site in [[Northeast China]].<ref>Zhang, Qun, Peng Liu, Hui-Yuan Yeh, Xingyu Man, Lixin Wang, Hong Zhu, Qian Wang, and Quanchao Zhang. "Intentional cranial modification from the Houtaomuga Site in Jilin, China: Earliest evidence and longest in situ practice during the Neolithic Age." ''American Journal of Physical Anthropology'' 169, no. 4 (2019): 747-756. [https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/ied Summary online]</ref> Most had fronto-occipital modification, but there were other types of modification discovered as well. It was found that the practice had been practiced for thousands of years, some skulls being much older than others.

==Methods and types== Deformation usually begins just after birth for the next couple of years until the desired shape has been reached or the child rejects the apparatus.<ref name=Dingwall31ch2/>{{page needed|date=August 2015}}<ref name="Trinkaus1982"/><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Antón |first1=Susan C. |last2=Weinstein |first2=Karen J. |title=Artificial cranial deformation and fossil Australians revisited |journal=Journal of Human Evolution |date=February 1999 |volume=36 |issue=2 |pages=195–209 |doi=10.1006/jhev.1998.0266|pmid=10068066 |bibcode=1999JHumE..36..195A }}</ref>

There is no broadly established classification system for cranial deformations, and many scientists have developed their own classification systems without agreeing on a single system for all forms observed.<ref name=Hoshower95>{{cite journal |last1=Hoshower |first1=Lisa M. |last2=Buikstra |first2=Jane E. |last3=Goldstein |first3=Paul S. |last4=Webster |first4=Ann D. |title=Artificial Cranial Deformation at the Omo M10 Site: A Tiwanaku Complex from the Moquegua Valley, Peru |journal=Latin American Antiquity |date=June 1995 |volume=6 |issue=2 |pages=145–164 |doi=10.2307/972149|jstor=972149 |s2cid=163711418 }}</ref> An example of an individual system is that of E. V. Zhirov, who described three main types of artificial cranial deformation—round, fronto-occipital, and sagittal—for occurrences in Europe and Asia, in the 1940s.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Žirov |first=E. V. |year=1940 |title=Ob iskusstvennoy deformatsii golovy |journal=Kratkie soobshcheniya Instituta istorii materialnoy kultury |volume=8 |pages=81–88 |language=ru}}</ref>{{rp|82}}

<gallery widths="200px" heights="200px"> Image:Maya cranial deformation.gif|Various methods used by the Mayan people to shape a child's head Image:Kane Caw Wacham.jpg|Painting by [[Paul Kane]], showing a [[Chinookan peoples|Chinookan]] child in the process of having their head flattened, and an adult after the process File:Braus 1921 387.png|An anatomical illustration from the 1921 German edition of {{Lang|de|Anatomie des Menschen: ein Lehrbuch für Studierende und Ärzte}} with Latin terminology </gallery>

==Motivations and theories== According to one modern theory, cranial deformation was likely performed to signify group affiliation<ref name=Hoshower95/><ref name=Gerszten95>{{cite journal |last1=Gerszten |first1=Peter C. |last2=Gerszten |first2=Enrique |title=Intentional Cranial Deformation |journal=Neurosurgery |date=1 September 1995 |volume=37 |issue=3 |pages=374–382 |doi=10.1227/00006123-199509000-00002 |pmid=7501099}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Tubbs |first1=R. Shane |last2=Salter |first2=E.G. |last3=Oakes |first3=W.J. |title=Artificial cranial deformation: a historical review |journal=Neurosurgical Focus |date=15 September 2006 |volume=21 |issue=3 |page=E5 |doi=10.3171/foc.2006.21.3.5 |pmid=17029355}}</ref> or to demonstrate [[status symbol|social status]]. Such motivations may have played a key role in [[Maya civilization|Maya]] society,<ref name=Gerszten95/> aimed at creating a skull shape that is aesthetically more pleasing or associated with desirable cultural attributes. For example, in the [[Na'ahai]]-speaking area of [[Tomman Island]] and the south-southwestern [[Malakula]]n (Australasia), a person with an elongated head is thought to be more intelligent, of higher [[social status|status]], and closer to the world of the spirits.<ref>{{cite web |last=Barras |first=Colin |title=Why early humans reshaped their children's skulls |website=BBC Earth |date=13 October 2014 |url=http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141013-why-we-reshape-childrens-skulls |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref>

Historically, there have been various theories regarding the motivations for these practices.

[[File:Bellamy.JPG|thumb|upright|Lithographs of skulls by J. Basire]] It has also been suggested that the practice of cranial deformation originated as an attempt to emulate groups in which an elongated head shape was a natural condition. The skulls of some [[ancient Egypt]]ians are among those identified as often being naturally elongated, and [[macrocephaly]] may be a familial characteristic. For example, Rivero and [[Johann Jakob von Tschudi|Tschudi]] describe an [[Mummy#Inca mummies|Inca mummy]] containing a fetus with an elongated skull, describing it thus:

{{blockquote|the same formation [i.e., absence of the signs of artificial pressure] of the head presents itself in children yet unborn; and of this truth we have had convincing proof in the sight of a foetus, enclosed in the womb of a mummy of a pregnant woman, which we found in a cave of Huichay, two leagues from [[Tarma]], and which is, at this moment, in our collection. Professor [[Josef Servas d'Outrepont|d'Outrepont]], of great Celebrity in the department of obstetrics, has assured us that the foetus is one of seven months' age. It belongs, according to a very clearly defined formation of the cranium, to the tribe of the [[Huanca people|Huancas]]. We present the reader with a drawing of this conclusive and interesting proof in opposition to the advocates of mechanical action as the sole and exclusive cause of the phrenological form of the Peruvian race.<ref name=RiveroTschudi51>{{cite book |last1=Rivero y Ustáriz |first1=Mariano Eduardo |author-link1=Mariano Eduardo de Rivero y Ustáriz |last2=von Tschudi |first2=Johann Jakob |author-link2=Johann Jakob von Tschudi |title=Antigüedades peruanas |trans-title=Peruvian Antiquities |year=1851 |location=Vienna |publisher=Imprenta Imperial de la Corte y del Estado |oclc=3027283 |language=es}}</ref>}}

P. F. Bellamy makes a similar observation about two elongated skulls of infants, which were discovered and brought to England by a "Captain Blankley" and handed over to the Museum of the Devon and Cornwall Natural History Society in 1838. According to Bellamy, these skulls belonged to two infants, female and male, "one of which was not more than a few months old, and the other could not be much more than one year."<ref name=Bellamy1842>{{cite journal |last=Bellamy |first=P. F. |title=A brief Account of two Peruvian Mummies in the Museum of the Devon and Cornwall Natural History Society |journal=Annals and Magazine of Natural History |volume=10 |issue=63 |date=October 1842 |pages=95–100 |url=https://archive.org/details/cbarchive_36786_abriefaccountoftwoperuvianmumm1840/page/n1/mode/2up |access-date=27 April 2025}}</ref> He writes:

{{blockquote|It will be manifest from the general contour of these skulls that they are allied to those in the Museum of the College of Surgeons in London, denominated Titicacans. Those adult skulls are very generally considered to be distorted by the effects of pressure; but in opposition to this opinion Dr. Graves has stated that "a careful examination of them has convinced him that their peculiar shape cannot be owing to artificial pressure;" and to corroborate this view, we may remark that the peculiarities are as great in the child as in the adult, and indeed more in the younger than in the elder of the two specimens now produced: and the position is considerably strengthened by the great relative length of the large bones of the cranium; by the direction of the plane of the [[occipital bone]], which is not forced upwards, but occupies a place in the under part of the skull; by the further absence of marks of pressure, there being no elevation of the vertex nor projection of either side; and by the fact of there being no instrument nor mechanical contrivance suited to produce such an alteration of form (as these skulls present) found in connection with them.<ref name=Bellamy1842/>}}

==Health effects== There is no statistically significant difference in [[cranial capacity]] between artificially deformed skulls and normal skulls in Peruvian samples.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Martin Frieß|author2=Michel Baylac|title=Exploring artificial cranial deformation using elliptic Fourier analysis of procrustes aligned outlines|date=2003|volume=122|issue=1|pages=11–22|doi=10.1002/ajpa.10286|journal=American Journal of Physical Anthropology|pmid=12923900}}</ref>

==See also==

* [[Foot binding]] * [[Plagiocephaly]]

==Notes== {{Notelist}}

==References== {{Reflist}}

==Further reading== * {{cite book |last= Trinkaus |first= Erik |date=1982|title= The Shanidar Neandertals | location=New York, NY, USA | publisher = Academic Press }} * Tiesler, Vera (2013) ''The Bioarchaeology of Artificial Cranial Modifications: New Approaches to Head Shaping and its Meanings in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica and Beyond [Vol. 7, Springer Interdisciplinary Contributions to Archaeology],'' Berlin, NY, USA:Springer Science & Business, {{ISBN|978-1-4614-8760-9}}, see [https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1461487609], accessed 1 August 2015. * FitzSimmons, Ellen; Jack H. Prost & Sharon Peniston (1998) "Infant Head Molding, A Cultural Practice," ''Arch. Fam. Med.'', '''7''' (January/February). * {{cite journal | last1 = Adebonojo | first1 = F. O. | year = 1991 | title = Infant head shaping | journal = J. Am. Med. Assoc. | volume = 265 | issue = 9 | page = 1179 | doi = 10.1001/jama.265.9.1179 | pmid = 1996005 }} * Henshen, F. (1966) ''The Human Skull: A Cultural History,'' New York, NY, USA: Frederick A. Praeger.

==External links== {{commons category|Artificial cranial deformation}} * [http://www.mackaos.com.au/Articles/crandef.html Mathematical Analysis of Artificial Cranial Deformation] * Reconstruction of an [[Ostrogoth]] woman from a skull (intentionally deformed), discovered in [[Globasnitz]] ([[Carinthia (state)|Carinthia]], [[Austria]]) : [https://web.archive.org/web/20120325061215/http://www.sciencephoto.com/images/download_lo_res.html?id=699000382], [http://www.sciencephoto.com/media/185395/enlarge], [https://web.archive.org/web/20120325061233/http://www.sciencephoto.com/images/download_lo_res.html?id=699000384], [https://web.archive.org/web/20120325061240/http://www.sciencephoto.com/images/download_lo_res.html?id=699000386], [https://web.archive.org/web/20120325061246/http://www.sciencephoto.com/images/download_lo_res.html?id=699000387]. * [http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/parents-have-been-reshaping-their-kids-skulls-45000-years-180957343/?no-ist Parents Have Been Reshaping Their Kids' Skulls for 45,000 Years]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Artificial Cranial Deformation}} [[Category:Body modification]] [[Category:Skull]] [[Category:Traditions]] [[Category:Deformation (mechanics)]]