Dr. Panchanan Mitra (Bengali: পঞ্চানন মিত্র) (25 May 1892 – 25 July 1936) was the first professor of anthropology in India. He was among the first Indians to study at Yale University and conducted several anthropological expeditions in India and abroad. He was the head of the Department of Anthropology of the University of Calcutta and is most known for his works Prehistoric India (1923), History of Ameri-can Anthropology (1930) and Indo-Poly-nesian Memories (1933).