I understood what you said, but I am making the point that saying the Egyptians were between the darkest black Sudanese and the lightest Asiatics is not any sort of precise anthropological description of Egyptian features. So many features could fit into that space that it is a totally useless way of describing how the Egyptians may have looked. Using such terminology would include most African Americans, most Brazilians, most Africans (those who are not as dark as Sudanese), most Indians, most Arabians, most Southern Europeans, most people from Israel, most people from Palestine, most people from Jordan, most people from Iraq, most South Asians and so forth.

When talking about phenotype and anthropology it is not good to use artwork and broad statements like, "we know they painted themselves as between Sudan and the Levant". That really does not clarify anything.

If someone is serious about this, they would reference the anthropological studies that describe how the features of the Egyptians have changed over time. No population on earth is immune to such changes and that is why we can use craniofacial measurements to get a general idea of how populations have migrated and interacted over time. That is how you get a good understanding of population dynamics, features and an understanding of physical diversity. So, yes, Egyptians are descended from ancient Egyptians but they do not have the exact same make up of features as they did in ancient times.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/15/2007 08:44PM by Doug M.