skeleton (skel'eton)

The hard portion of the body designed for the support or protection of the soft parts, axial s. The vertebral column, skull, sternum, and ribs, in contradistinction to the appendicular parts, branchial s. The o eous or cartilaginous support of branchiae, cartilaginous S. The embryonic cartilaginous precursor of the entire s. except the vault of the cranium, the bones of the face, and the inner plate of the pterygoid proce of the sphenoid bone, craniovertebral s. That portion of the s. that includes the cranium and the vertebrae. [Gr., from skellein, to dry up.] Skene's on each glands. side of the Two floor tubules found, of the one urethra of the human female, which extend from the meatus urinarius upward from three eighths to three-quarters of an inch, and open upon of membrane the the free urethra, surface within of "^he the mucous labia of the meatus urinarius.