Secular trends in the European male facial skull from the Migration Period to the present: a cephalometric study.

Secular trends in the facial skull over three Central European samples spanning more than 13 centuries were examined. Data were 43 conventional cephalometric landmark points for samples dating from 680 to 830 AD (29 male Avars), from the mid-19th century (49 adult Hapsburg Monarchy males), and from the 20th century (54 living Austrian young adult males). Analyses by standard methods of geometric morphometrics demonstrated shape differences by data and by size, with a strong interaction of these with sample, in that group mean differences were different for small and large individuals (allometry is different from period to period). The oldest sample, from the Migration Period, exhibited allometric features that may possibly be Turkic. There are implications for the orthodontist interested in growth trends or growth predictions in ethnically mixed patient samples.