General Anatomy, Applied to Physiology and Medicine, Vol. 3 (of 3)Bichat, Xavier
Science
General Anatomy, Applied to Physiology and Medicine, Vol. 3 (of 3)
Bichat, Xavier
Human anatomy; Human physiology
2d. There are other wrinkles which are owing also to the motions, but
not to those of the subjacent muscles. There are those of the sole of
the foot, and especially those of the palm of the hand. There is not
there any sub-cutaneous muscle adhering to the skin, except the small
palmar muscle, which has no agency in these wrinkles that are formed at
the places where the skin is constantly folded in flexion. Thus there
are many of them about all the articulations of the phalanges. In the
palm of the hand, we see three principal ones, one at the base of the
thumb, produced by the motion of opposition, another at the anterior
part of the palm, occasioned by the flexion of the four last phalanges
which are bent towards the thumb, and the third is found in the middle
of the palm. The dermis is folded between these depressed lines, in
the motions in which the hand is hollowed. Many other small folds
corresponding with less evident and less frequent motions, cut these at
different angles.
On the back of the foot and hand, there are many wrinkles about each
articulation of the phalanges, when they are extended. They disappear
in flexion, and are owing to this, that nature, on account of the
motions, has made the skin more loose at this place, and broader in
proportion to the parts it covers. About most of the articulations,
there are analogous folds, but they are much less evident, because the
skin adheres less to the neighbouring parts. Upon the whole trunk, the
arm, the fore-arm, the thigh and the leg, we see no depressions but
those from the muscular prominences.
3d. There is a third species of wrinkles, or rather cutaneous
impressions, which are not very evident, found especially on the sole
of the foot and the palm of the hand and which we easily distinguish
from the preceding; they are those which indicate the rows of the
papillæ. The surface of the trunk presents hardly any thing similar.
4th. Finally, there are the wrinkles of old age, which are of a wholly
different nature. The sub-cutaneous fat having in part disappeared, the
skin becomes too large for the parts it covers; now as it has lost with
age its contractility of texture, it does not contract, but folds in
various directions. Thus where there was the most fat, as on the face,
these wrinkles are the most evident, they resemble those that appear on
the abdomen after several pregnancies, dropsy, &c. In young people, if
emaciation takes place suddenly, the skin contracts, and no wrinkle is
formed.
II. _Internal Surface of the Dermoid System._
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