Phrenology was the science of discerning the traits and proclivities of individuals by measuring the bumps of the head. George H. Combe was one of the founding fathers of this study. It enjoyed an enormous vogue throughout the middle of the nineteenth century and had an especial appeal for women's rights activists because Combe's researches and those of other phrenologists disclosed no significant differences between men and women in terms of the size and shape of the bumps of their heads. Below is a standard phrenological chart showing the specific areas of the skull which supposedly corresponded to particular qualities.