The old fashioned chimerical concept of "race" is hopelessly inadequate to deal with the human biological reality of Egypt, ancient or modern. But neither the use of clines nor clusters alone can present a complete account. An assessment of both is necessary before we can understand the biological nature of the people of the Nile valley. Because the ancient Egyptians lived with this knowledge of themselves, they "did not think in terms of race" (Yurco 1989:24).

For our own part, we should recognize how "presumptuous" it is "to assign our own primitive racial labels" (Yurco 1989:58) to them or to anyone else. These not only prevent us from dealing with human biological variation in an adequate fashion; but they also lend themselves to the perpetuation of social injustice. The "race" concept did not exist in Egypt, and it is not mentioned in Herodotus, the Bible, or any of the other writings of classical antiquity. Since it has neither biological nor social justification, we should strive to see that is it eliminated from both public and private usage. Its absence will be missed by no one, and we shall all be better off without it. R.I.P.

C. Loring Brace, David P. Tracer, Lucia Allen Yaroch, John Robb, Kari Brandt and A. Russell Nelson. 1993. Clines and clusters versus "race:" A test in ancient Egypt and a case of a death on the Nile. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology 36:26.