Based on the results of anthropometric surveys of the male Jewish population of Israel, conducted in 1970, 1985 and 2000 and covering 5,261 people, the authors analyze the secular changes in body size and shape that occurred over 30 years in two ethnographic groups of Jews - Ashkenazi and Sephardic. It is shown that the intensity of epochal changes was not the same. In the Ashkenazi group, the main increase in body length occurred from 1970 to 1985. Sephardim have a slight decrease in height at this time. This feature in the epochal dynamics is explained by the large influx of migrants from the African continent in the 1980s, who sharply differ in morphological type from the majority of the male population of Israel. By 2000, the gap in body size between Ashkenazis and Sephardim is narrowing due to living in favorable conditions. The decrease in morphological differences during the period under review can be explained by active mestizo processes, as well as more favorable growth and development conditions than in the countries from which the repatriates arrived.

Keywords: metisation, secular trend, taxonomic distance, Hotelling criterion.

Introduction

The formation of the anthropological characteristics of the population of any state is largely due to historical development. This is usually a long process involving both the peoples permanently residing in this territory and migrants from other countries who are actively involved in ethnogenesis. There are known states whose population was formed at the expense of migrants; changes in its anthropological composition largely depended on the ethnic origin of migrants. The processes of anthropological transformation of the population in these countries and the countries from which emigration took place were similar. This is due to the relative length of stay of migrants in the new territories, their large number, as well as social and racial segregation, which minimized the mixing of aboriginal and alien populations. The USA is a classic example of such a course of ethnogenesis. There, these global processes of morphological transformation of the population (secular trend, acceleration, debrachicephalization, etc.) proceeded synchronously with similar changes in the countries of Western Europe.

The population of modern Israel was formed in a slightly different scenario. Due to historical conditions, this state was conceived as a Jewish, mono-ethnic state. Historical reasons and the short period of time during which the Jewish state was formed predetermined ethnogenetic features that were reflected in the anthropological structure of the population. The peculiarity of this structure is largely determined by the ratio of the components of the ethnic group, which in the relatively short period of the existence of the State of Israel changed both in terms of the numerical composition and the place of birth of migrants. As the dynamics of the formation of the population of modern Israel shows, differences in the anthropological status of newcomers were primarily due to the racial characteristics of immigrants from Africa (Table 1).

The processes of anthropological transformation of the population of the re-created Jewish state throughout the world-

Table 1. Dynamics of repatriation to Israel in 1948-2005

yes attracted close attention of anthropologists, geneticists, epidemiologists, psychologists and specialists who were interested in the problems of forming an ethnic group of a new state. A number of studies are devoted to the problems of ethnogenetic identity of immigrants from different countries. Experts have identified a certain unity in the systems of features with continuous variability (body size); it is evident when comparing groups of Jews with the titular population of the countries from which the repatriation took place [Kobyliansky, Arensburg, 1977; Kobyliansky, Arensburg, Nathan, 1979-1980; Kobyliansky, 1983, 1991]. The same researchers found that the monolocus systems (blood proteins) of Jews, regardless of their place of residence, quite clearly differ from the groups of the titular population.

The issues of morphological transformation of the population, the dynamics of this process over time, as well as the factors that determine secular changes in body size and shape have remained almost unenlightened. This study aims to analyze the dynamics and direction of epochal changes in the main total body sizes observed from 1970 to 2000. Since secular changes themselves can be explained by a number of reasons, we consider a hypothetical model of an "ethnic cauldron", in which the initial differences between representatives of two subethnic groups of Jews - Sephardim and Ashkenazi-are leveled. The polygenic nature of inheritance and the exogenous plasticity of anthropometric traits allow us to fairly accurately and objectively assess the "biological" distances between these groups of the Israeli population during the period under review.

Material and methods

The work is based on the results of surveys conducted in 1970 and 1985 by employees of Tel Aviv University, as well as the results of studies in 2000, in which one of the authors participated [Borovsky, 2007; Purunjan, Borovsky, Belkin, 2008]. 5,261 men were examined. The anthropometric program included measurements of total body size. All measurements were made in accordance with the classical anthropometric method adopted by the Research Institute and Museum of Anthropology of Moscow State University.The weight-weight index (BMI) was calculated. The data analysis was carried out taking into account the respondents ' belonging to one of two ethnographic groups - Ashkenazi (n = 1,985) and Sephardic (n = 3,276). The average age of the Ashkenazi group is 22.3 and the Sephardic group is 20.5 years old.

Results and discussion

Even a simple comparison of the average values of anthropometric characteristics indicates that from 1970 to 2000, the morphological structure of the male population of Israel underwent major changes (Table 2). Most likely, they reflect the patterns of epochal transformation processes and are largely a consequence of the complex demographic transformations that took place in the country during the period under review. According to Table 2, the intensity of epochal changes recorded in different periods in the two studied groups of the Jewish population was not the same. So, in the Ashkenazi group, the main increase in body length occurred in 1970-1985. During this period, even a slight decrease in height was observed in Sephardim. This feature of the dynamics of body size in Sephardim can be explained by the influx in the mid-1980s of groups from the African continent, which had a sharply different morphological type compared to the majority of the male population of Israel. By 2000, probably due to favorable living conditions during the growth and development of children and adolescents, the gap in body length is narrowing. Ana-

Table 2. Arithmetic mean values of total anthropometric dimensions in the examined groups

Results of discriminant analysis of epochal changes in two groups of the Jewish population Table 3.*

* In all cases, p < 0.001.

** Wilkes ' λ = 0.506.

*** Wilkes ' λ = 0.789.

See Table 4. Values of canonical variables for epoch groups

logical conclusions can also be drawn from the other body sizes shown in Table 2.

In general, it can be stated that the intensity of epochal dynamics is significantly lower in the Sephardic group. The high intensity of epochal processes in the Ashkenazi group can be explained by a whole range of reasons. First, the significantly greater anthropological homogeneity of Ashkenazi Jews. They are representatives of various variants of the Caucasian race, who arrived in Israel mainly from European countries, where the processes of secular change in body size were actively taking place in the post-war period. Therefore, in the conditions of a fairly high standard of living in Israel, the epochal changes among Ashkenazi Jews were a kind of continuation of the processes that were observed in the countries from which they came.

To estimate the scale of epochal transformations based on a set of features, we performed multiple discriminant (canonical) analysis (Tables 3, 4), which allows us to calculate taxonomic (in our case, morphological) distances between groups belonging to different periods. In the course of the analysis, new integrative features are calculated-canonical variables that are algebraic sums of the original anthropometric features. An important property of canonical variables is the ability to estimate the taxonomic distance expressed in units of intra-group standard deviation. The quality of the analysis results is estimated by the canonical correlation value R (the larger it is, the higher it is), and the statistical significance of group discrimination is estimated by the Wilkes - X criterion (the smaller its value, the better).

Epochal dynamics are more pronounced in the Ashkenazi group. This is indicated not only by the values of the R and X qualities of discrimination, but also by the canonical variables (Z). These new traits have slightly wider limits of variation in the Ashkenazi group, compared to the Sephardic group. The range of variation of Z in Ashkenazis is 2.1 standard deviations. To estimate and scale this value, recall that the standard deviation over body length is approximately 6 cm. Consequently, the magnitude of morphological differences between epochal groups in Ashkenazis by the complex of features is equivalent to a difference in body length of 12.6 cm. A similar value in the Sephardic group is 11.8 cm. According to the second canonical variable, the range of variation of epochal groups is also larger in the Ashkenazi group and is equal to 1.31 and 0.89 standard deviations, respectively.

Canonical analysis allows us to estimate in a concentrated form the total differences between new integrative features when comparing them.

See Table 5. Results of comparison of Sephardic and Ashkenazi groups by a complex of characteristics

* ^T2 = 49.02; F (8; 3 749) = 6.12; p < 0.000.

** ^T2 = 29.40; F (8; 317) = 3.60; p < 0.001.

*** ^T2 = 16.65; F (8; 490) = 2.05; p< 0.039.

groups by period. At the same time, the dynamics of morphological differences between Ashkenazi and Sephardic groups over 30 years is of considerable interest. Their scale and direction will indicate the depth of integrative processes that level out the initial anthropological (morphological) differences that occurred among the first-generation migrants. In addition to the processes of mestizoization, the alignment of morphological parameters is also facilitated by more favorable growth and development conditions than in the countries from which the repatriates arrived.

To answer these questions, Ashkenazi and Sephardic groups were compared for the entire set of characteristics using the Hotelling - ^T2 test, which is a multidimensional analogue of the Student's t-test. The mathematical basis of the ^T2 criterion is the so-called Mahalanobis distance, adjusted for the number of groups being compared:

where and are the number of groups compared, and is the Mahalanobis distance (Deryabin, 2008).

The data in Table 5 clearly reflect the dynamics of morphological rearrangements that are directly related to repatriation processes. Young people (Sephardim) surveyed in 1970 were children of the first wave of immigrants (see Table 1).Despite the difficulties, the entire period of their growth and development took place in Israel in much more favorable conditions than in the countries from which they came (Yemen, Iraq, Morocco). This conclusion is consistent with the classical data of Boas [1912,1940] and Shapiro [1939] on the influence of more favorable environmental conditions on growth processes in immigrants from Europe and Japan who arrived in the United States. This is probably one of the reasons why Sephardim had a larger body size than Ashkenazim. Interestingly, the differences are significant not only for the complex of features, but also for each of them separately.

The situation changed radically in 1985, when the population of Israel was replenished with numerous repatriates from Eastern Europe and the USSR. To date, the standard of living in these countries has significantly improved compared to the post-war period, which, combined with the anthropological characteristics of Ashkenazi Jews, who are mostly carriers of purely Caucasian features, determined the direction of differences between the groups under consideration (see Table 5).

By the time of the second stage of research (1985), the morphological structure of the male population was influenced by mestizo processes, and the degree of segregation of immigrants from Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa decreased. This is indirectly indicated by a decrease in the value of ^T2 and the appearance of unreliable differences between the signs.

The trends outlined by 1985, reflecting the process of consolidation of Jewish society, sharply intensified by 2000.-

However, significant differences were preserved only in body length. The differences in other attributes are small and statistically insignificant. As a result, however, a peculiar cumulative effect emerged : differences in the entire set of traits were significant (see Table 5).

The most important condition that ensured the leveling of morphological differences is the secular increase in body size in 1985-2000; it was more pronounced in Sephardic Jews. During this time period, the body length of Sephardim increased by 2.44 cm, and Ashkenazi - only by 0.86 cm. Consequently, the intensity of epochal processes in the Sephardic group by 2000 was 3 times higher than in the Ashkenazi group. Thus, Israeli society is experiencing the same processes that contribute to the intensification of growth and development-a consequence of improving living standards-that were observed in a number of Western countries [Boas, 1912; Bindon and Zansky, 1986; Secular Growth Changes..., 1998; Bogin, 1988, 1999; Johnston et al., 1985].

In general, comparing the level of differences between Ashkenazis and Sephardim, we can see a decrease in the taxonomic distance between these groups. This trend can be roughly estimated by the steady decrease in the ^T2*-Hotelling values over 30 years: they decreased by 3 times (see Table 5).

Conclusion

A comparative analysis of the epochal transformation of the morphological type of the Jewish population of Israel shows that complex structural changes occurred in the ethnic composition during the 30th anniversary under consideration. They were the result of a massive influx of returnees. The main part of the migration flow was made up of natives of North Africa and Eastern Europe-carriers of very different types of anthropological composition. As a result of migration, the morphological structure of two ethnographic groups of Jews - Ashkenazi and Sephardic-has radically changed and, as a result, the vector of morphological differences has changed. It can be assumed that in the case of a significant reduction in the mechanical influx of migrants, the morphological characteristics of the representatives of these groups will converge. This will be due to both endogenous (mestizo) and exogenous factors of life, which largely determine the course and completeness of the realization of hereditary potency in the process of growth and development.

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The article was submitted to the Editorial Board on 12.05.08.

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