"Roman nose" redirects here. For the Cheyenne warrior, seeHook Nose.
An "aquiline" nasal profileFrom parody nose classificationNotes on Noses: "It indicates great decision, considerable Energy, Firmness, Absence of Refinement, and disregard for thebienseances of life".[1]
Anaquiline nose (also called aRoman nose) is ahuman nose with a prominentbridge, giving it the appearance of being curved or slightly bent. The wordaquiline comes from theLatin wordaquilinus ("eagle-like"), an allusion to the curvedbeak of aneagle.[2][3][4] While some have ascribed the aquiline nose to specific ethnic, racial, or geographic groups, and in some cases associated it with other supposed non-physical characteristics (i.e. intelligence, status, personality, etc.—see below), no scientific studies or evidence support any such linkage. As with many phenotypical expressions (e.g. 'widow's peak', eye color,earwax type) it is found in many geographically diverse populations.
Inracist discourse, especially that of post-Enlightenment Western writers, a Roman nose has been characterized as a marker of beauty and nobility.[5] A well-known example of the aquiline nose as a marker contrasting the bearer with their contemporaries is the protagonist ofAphra Behn'sOroonoko (1688). Although an African prince, he speaks French, has straightened hair, thin lips, and a "nose that was rising and Roman instead of African and flat".[6] These features set him apart from most of his peers, and marked him instead as noble and on par with Europeans.[7][8][9]
In the context ofscientific racism, writers have attributed aquiline noses as a characteristic ofdifferent "races"; e.g.Jan Czekanowski claimed that it was characteristic of theArabid race,Armenoid race,Mediterranean race, andDinarid race.[10] In 1899,William Z. Ripley claimed that it was characteristic of peoples ofTeutonic descent.[11] The supposed science ofphysiognomy, popular during theVictorian era, made the "prominent" nose a marker ofAryanness: "the shape of the nose and the cheeks indicated, like the forehead's angle, the subject's social status and level of intelligence. A Roman nose was superior to a snub nose in its suggestion of firmness and power, and heavy jaws revealed a latent sensuality and coarseness".[12]
^John C. Fredriksen (1 January 2001).America's Military Adversaries: From Colonial Times to the Present. ABC-CLIO. p. 432.ISBN978-1-57607-603-3.He matured into a powerfully built man, tall, muscular, with an aquiline profile that gave rise to the name Woquni, or 'Hook Nose'. The whites translated this into the more familiar moniker of Roman Nose. In his early youth, Roman Nose ...
^Adams, Mikaëla M. (2009). "Savage Foes, Noble Warriors, and Frail Remnants: Florida Seminoles in the White Imagination, 1865-1934".The Florida Historical Quarterly.87 (3):404–35.JSTOR20700234.
^Gates, Henry Louis (1998)."Introduction". In Henry Louis Gates; William L. Andrews (eds.).Pioneers of the Black Atlantic: Five Slave Narratives from the Enlightenment, 1772-1815. Civitas. pp. 1–30.ISBN9781887178983.
^Czekanowski, Jan (1934).Człowiek w Czasie i Przestrzeni (eng. A Human in Time and Space) - The lexicon of biological anthropology. Kraków, Poland: Trzaska, Ewert i Michalski - Bibljoteka Wiedzy.
^Cowling, Mary (1989).The Artist as Anthropologist: The Representation of Type and Character in Victorian Art. Cambridge. Cambridge UP. Quoted inMcNees, Eleanor (2004). "Punch and the Pope: Three Decades of Anti-Catholic Caricature".Victorian Periodicals Review.37 (1):18–45.JSTOR20083988.
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