ACCESSORY MAMMALIAN REPRODUCTIVE GLANDS 



371 



— RIGHT SEMINAL VESICLE- 



COAGULATING GLAND 



DORSAl 

 PROSTATE 



LATERAL 



DUCTUS 

 -DEFERENS 



BLADDER 



URETHRA 



Fig. 6.3. Male guinea pig accessory reproductive glands. (From E. Ortiz, D. Price, H. G. 

 Williams-Ashman and J. Banks, Endocrinology, 59, 479-492, 1956.) 



mans concluded that monotremes lack pros- 

 tate glands, he described a concentration of 

 urethral glands at the neck of the bladder 

 in the duckbill platypus. Ornithorhyncus 

 poradoxicus. The diagrams in his mono- 

 graph suggest that this concentration of 

 complicated glands is a disseminate type of 

 prostate. 



There has been confusion in the nomen- 

 clature of the lobes of the prostate in the 

 rat and in the descriptions of the structure 

 of the lobes. In early studies the application 

 of human anatomic terminology to rodents 

 resulted in designation of the lobes as ante- 

 rior (ventral), middle, and posterior (dor- 

 sal). Later terminology, more suitable for 



cfuadrupedal animals, led to anterior (cra- 

 nial), middle, and posterior (caudal). Un- 

 fortunately, combinations of these two sys- 

 tems of nomenclature still occur in the 

 literature, and there is uncertainty as to the 

 number of histologically distinguishable re- 

 gions or lobes. In view of the current inter- 

 est in the chemical composition of the 

 glands and their secretions the subject will 

 be reviewed. 



For many years the prostate was usually 

 described as being composed of three pairs 

 of lobes: cranial or anterior (coagulating 

 glands) bound to the seminal vesicles; mid- 

 dle or dorsolateral nearly encircling the 

 urethra dorsolaterally, and the ^-entral or 



