PELVIC LIMBS 733 



ment for ligaments, and its internal surface overhangs and forms the 

 outer wall of a deep groove on the lower part of the posterior-external 

 surface and the posterior part of the distal surface of the lower ex- 

 tremity of the bone. This groove is converted by bridge-like ligaments 

 into a canal which transmits the tendons of the peroneus brevis and 

 peroneus tertius muscles. Above this hook the posterior border of the 

 anterior-external surface is interrupted by a broad, deep groove pass- 

 ing from the posterior-external surface downward and forward. This 

 groove forms a canal for the tendon of the peroneus longus muscle. 



The posterior-external surface is longer than it is wide, and has 

 almost parallel sides, whereof the outer is common to it and the 

 anterior-external surface, and the posterior is the continuation of 

 the posterior-external border of the shaft directly downward and 

 backward. The surface is gently concave from above downward, and 

 faces backward and outward. Its lower part is grooved vertically 

 in front for the tendons of the peroneus brevis and peroneus tertius 

 muscles. 



The lower surface is wider posteriorly to accommodate this groove, 

 and for the rest of its extent transverse, sharp, and straight. 



Nomenclature. The first word for the fibula was perone, a pin, 

 used by the Greeks for the fibula of the ox and other domestic animals, 

 which ends below in a long point resembling a pin. Hippocrates used 

 the term for the human bone. The Romans called pins and clasps 

 fibulae, and Vesalius introduced fibula into anatomy as the translation 

 of perone. Os per one is sometimes used even now as a synonym, and 

 we find the Greek word still employed in the term the peroneal 

 muscles. The French word is le perone ; the German, das Wadenbein, 

 from ivade, the calf of the leg. 



Determination. When the fibula is held with the head upward 

 and the broad, flattened posterior surface toward the student, the hook 

 on the lower extremity is on the side to which the bone belongs. 



Articulation. The fibula articulates with the tibia and the 

 astragalus. 



Muscular Attachments. The following muscles are attached to 

 the fibula : to the head, the peroneus longus, the tibialis anticus, the 

 tibialis posticus, the flexor longus digitorum, and the soleus ; to the 

 shaft, the tibialis anticus, the tibialis posticus, the flexor longus 

 hallucis, the soleus, the peroneus tertius, and the peroneus brevis. 



