Sexual dimorphism of skull – A case report

The determination of an individual's sex is widely held to be the first step that should be undertaken in skeletal remains examination. Normally we recognize two sexes i.e. male and female, depending upon the primary and secondmy sex characteristics. While dealing with skeletal remains, an individual may possess the features of both male and female sexes, in which, it is best to look for the biologically most relevant traits. So it is important for a forensic osteologist to recognize five sexes i.e. definite male, probable male, unknown, probable female and definite female, because of the continuum of spectra of dimorphic features. A recently conducted examination of skeletal remains of an unknown individual, recovered from a forest, will be discussed with relevance to the same.