Part of 2 Letters from Mr. Thomas Molyneux concerning a Prodigious Os Frontis in the Medicine School at Leyden. Dec. 29th. 1684. and Febr. 13th 168₅ ⁴

Part of 2 Letters from Mr. Thomas Molyneux concerning a Prodigious Os Frontis in the Medicine School at Leyden. Dec. 29th. 1684. and Febr. 13th 1685. Herewith send you an Account of a prodigious large Os Frontis which I myself have seen, and measured according to the English Inch; 'tis reserved among severall other bones, and skeletons, that belong to the Medicine School, here at Leyden. And I take it to be the more observable, by reason, that altho' I have seen severall bones, of very large size, that were said to have been of Giants; yet I never was thoroughly satisfied, they really were so; imagining them only to have belonged to some other larger Creature, then a Man, whose bones for the most part, excepting those of the head, do not much differ from those of other Animals. But this being an entire Os Frontis, compleat every way, and differing in no respects from that of a Mans, but in its largeness; and since there's no Creature, especially of the larger sort that has this bone at all resembling ours; there's not the least Question to be made, but this formerly belonged to a Man, and that of a most extravagant large size. Its dimensions were as follow; from its juncture with the Nasal bones, to the place where the Sutura Sagittalis terminated the Convex way, 'twas 9 Inches; transversly from side to side, still measuring the Convex way 'twas 12 Inches; in thickness about half an Inch. I have measured this same bone in severall ordinary Skulls, according to all these Dimensions, and find that one with another, they scarce answer it in half proportion; for where it was 9. Inches, they are but 4 Inches and a half, and where it was 12 Inches, they are not above, and and in thickness not above \( \frac{1}{4} \) of an Inch. Now arguing that this bone bears that proportion to his stature, which the same in other Men does to theirs, it must follow that he was more than twice as tall as men usually are; and according to the most moderate computation, supposing the height of a Man to be no more than five foot 6 Inches, he to whom this bone belonged, must have been at least more than 11 or 12 foot high, a prodigious height for a Man, and such as some will scarce allow ever to have been, Sed ex Fronte Herculem, &c. Part of another Letter relating to the same subject. As to the Quære concerning the bone, I cannot satisfy you; were there any Account to have been got of it, I had certainly sent it you before: it has been kept here these several years; and the present Professor of Anatomy Dr. Drelin-court once told me, he found it among the rest of the bones and Skeletons, when he first came into that place, but never could learn who gave it, where 'twas found, or whence it came. That there are some whose heads are very large in proportion to their Body, cannot be denied, yet generally such Skulls want in thickness (as this does not,) are ill shaped, and not proportionable; and moreover I'm perswaded there never yet was an Instance of any head, which by a præternaturall growth, came the least nigh this for bulk; and as I conceive, 'tis far more probable, and easier to allow, that a Body bore this head which was proportionable to it, then that it belonged to a Man of ordinary stature; who in this particular, would certainly have been in one fence, the greatest Monster the World ever saw.