Race biology as a science and its impact on the Swedish society in the nineteenth-century: Tracing Anders Retzius plaster cast skull collection and his tribute to anthropology.

Abstract

This thesis is about the history of the usage of plaster casts within nineteenth-century physical anthropology. It has researched the ethics behind them, why they were used within the science and their importance to the historiography of racial science. It focuses on a swedish scientists by the name of Anders Retzius and his collection of plaster casts of skulls.