© Kamla-Raj 2004 Anthropologist, 6(2): 131-136 (2004)
Anthropometric Variation and Population Structure of
The Nicobarese Islanders
B.V. Ravi Prasad1 and Bhaskara B. Rao2
1. Anthropological Survey of India, A.P. Field Station C/o Department of
Anthropology, Andhra University Visakhapatnam 530 003,
Andhra Pradesh, India
2. Department of Anthropology, Andhra University,
Visakhapatnam 530 003, Andhra Pradesh, India
KEYWORDS Nicobarese. Anthropometry. R Matrix.
ABSTRACT The close resemblance of geographically and linguistically separated Niocobarese within Nicobar Islands had drawn attention of cultural anthropologists, physical anthropologists and linguistics. Studies conducted so far revealed that the Nicobarese are heterogeneous and the differences are mainly due to geographical isolation of Nicobar Islands and bio-type. The R-matrix which estimate the minimum degree of genetic divergence shows that the Nicobarese are homogeneous and this view corroborate oral tradition of Nicobarese.