ORIGINAL ARTICLE Anatomy of the levator claviculae, with an overview and a literature survey

The Author(s) 2012. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract We report here an anatomical study of the levator claviculae discovered during an anatomical dis-section course for medical students. The muscle was identified on the left side, and followed a typical topogra-phy to previous detections, originating from the transverse process of the fourth cervical vertebra and attaching to the upper facet of the middle part of the clavicle. Innervation to this muscle came from both the third and fourth rami of the cervical spinal nerves. Blood supply to the muscle could not be identified clearly. In this report, we undertook a comprehensive literature survey of this muscle dating back ca. 170 years, and attempted to ascertain the phylogenic and ontogenetic explanations for the development of this muscle