摘要：Two multivariate statistical methods; principal components analysis and discriminantfunction analysis, are used as an investigative procedure to elucidate historical relationships between early medieval populations from Central Europe with particular emphasis on the problem of Croat ethnogenesis. Mean values for eight cranial measurements from 39 sites, including eight from Croatia and two from Bosnia and Herzegovina, were first subjected to principal components analysis. The distribution ofthe sites on the first two principal components shows a clear spatial pattern with four well defined clusters. The first cluster comprises of Hungarian avaroslav sites west of the Danube, the second of Hungarian and Yugoslaz' avaroslav sites east of the Danube, the third of Slav sites from Austria, the Czech RepubliC and Slovenia, and the fourth ofPolish sites. Discriminantfunction analysis ofthe same sites supports this distribution. Two statistically Significant discriminant functions calculated from the craniometric data are able to classify the sites into the correct cluster with an accuracy of 96.5 %. When these discriminant functions were applied to the analyzed Croatian and Bosnian sites the folloWing results were achieved: the four Dalmatian sites: Nin, Mravinei, Danilo and Bribir were classified into the c/LlSter of Polish sites,' the two avaroslav sites: Privlaka cmd Stari Jankovci were classified into the cluster ofHungarian sites west of the Danube; and the two continental sites from the "B{jelo Brdo"cultural complex: Vukovar and Bijelo Brdo, were classified into the cluster of Slav sites from Austria, the Czech RepubliC and Slovenia. The two Bosnian sites. Comjenica and Bugojno were, together with the Dalmatian sites, classified into the cluster ofPolish sites. The same general distribution of Croat and Bosnian sites is also confirmed with principal components analysis. Inclusion of craniometric data from five "Iranian" sites belonging to the Scythian-Sarmatian cultures, added to the analysis beca~lSe some researchers believe that Croats developedfrom Iranian populations, shows that these two groups of populations exhibit little similarity in cranial morphology. The results of the two multivariate statistical procedures indicate that the Dalmatian Ci'oat populations, which formed the nucleus ofthe early Croat medieval state, were Slavic in origin, and that they migrated to the eastern Adriatic coast from an area somewhere in modern Poland, pOSSibly close to the Baltic Sea. These populations gradually expanded from the coastal area into the continental hinterland and by the 10. century reached as far n01th as the site of Comjenica (near Prijedor) in what is today Bosnia and Herzegovina. By the end of the 11. century they did not, however, expand as far north as to Bijelo Brdo and Vukovar, as these two sites were both classified into the cluster of Slav sites from Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovenia.
