On some aspects of Neandertal zygomatic morphology

Neandertals are characterized by a series of well-documented facial characteristics, including midfacial prognathism, large nasal and orbital areas, and a marked supraorbital torus. We provide a comparative morphometric study of another part of this facial complex, the frontal process of the zygomatic. We find that European Neandertals have a distinctly columnar form of the frontal process not found in recent modern humans and most Pleistocene modern humans. Some purportedly modern specimens and specimens pre-dating Neandertals exhibit the same pattern as European Neandertals, while others exhibit the modern human pattern. The columnar form is likely a retention of the ancestral state in Neandertals and the other late Pleistocene specimens that exhibit it, but variation in the pattern seen in early modern humans reveals possible insights into late Pleistocene human evolution.