Non-metric variation of the infracranial skeleton.

196 skeletons of known age, sex and rac from the Terry Collection were studied in order to document 30 non-metric infracranial traits. Each trait had the ability to be expressed bilaterally, although significant side dimorphism was not observed. Sex differences were statistically significant for some of the traits within a racial group, but these differences were not as pronounced as the differences generated by non-metric cranial traits in the same populations, and were not effective in all racial groups. In general, these infracranial traits show some age dependency when correlation statistics are used, but this dependency is lost when the more robust chi 2 statistic is used. These data suggest that infracranial non-metric traits may be superior to cranial non-metric traits for population comparisons. Infracranial traits may be more durable than cranial traits having regard to the nature of most archaeological material.