Hey Blog! This week, I’ll be discussing bones!
Until last month, I had never broken a bone. Then I failed to catch a cricket ball properly, and managed to break a finger. Three trips to the hospital later and five weeks in to wearing a splint, I can tell you what I know about bones.
There are 206 bones in the average adult human body. This includes everything from the femur, the thick thigh bone, to the miniscule ear bone which conducts vibrations down the ear canal so you can hear things. Eh? Babies have a few more, as to fit through the mother’s pelvis, their bony bits need to squash slightly smaller – so they are made with more bones, which later fuse. If you’ve ever seen a skull, the places the skull fuses are those little wiggly lines on the back of the head. Some bones aren’t even bone; cartilage – a rubbery bone-like stuff that forms your nose, covers your joints, and makes up shark “skeletons” – is used in place of bone in some parts of babies, and ossifies (turns to bone) later. Note – cartilage is not to be confused with keratin, which makes pangolin scales, and, less excitingly, your toenails. Nor is it to be confused with Carthage, which was a city beaten by Rome in the Punic Wars.
Humans are vertebrates, as are all mammals, birds, reptiles, and fish: we have a central spine, which holds the most important part of our nervous system, supports the body, and provides a base for the rest of our skeleton to be built off. If you are speaking to a human, you can’t accuse somebody of having no backbone, because all vertebrates have one. However, the spine, while perhaps the longest chain of bones in the body, does not hold the most bones. A quarter of those 206 are in the hands and feet – including phalanges (the finger bits), metacarpals (the back of the palm bit), tarsals (the wrist bit), and the very end of the arm bones, the radius and diameter. Sorry, the radius and ulna. I’ve got maths on the brain. I broke the last end bone on my left ring finger, at the joint, making it a fractured distal interphalangeal joint, commonly known as a mallet finger, probably because it’s easily done if you hit your finger with a mallet. For those who haven’t broken a bone, it hurts. 0 stars, do not recommend.
So, what if a group of graverobbers/archaeologists/obsessive fans of Home Ed in a Shed (delete as appropriate) found my skeleton after I’ve died? What clues as to my life could they deduce? Firstly, I have an eyebrow ridge and square-ended chin, which indicates a male, and I have a narrow notch in my pelvis, also suggesting a male (both correct). I have a curious line near my right temple where there is no bone – I have no idea what this signifies. The bones are long, and (so far) only one has any sign of a break, implying a tall build and little risk of excessive strain in my occupation. I would suspect reasonably average tendon attachments, so medium strength; definitely more strongly pronounced in the legs than the arms. Powerful tendons in my fingers, possibly signifying a pianist (correct); and hopefully not too much wear on the joints. Perhaps a little less strong than they could be, indicating a dislike of milk, but still strong, indicating a liking for cheese (both correct). The rest they would have to piece together from my grave goods – an item from every period in history should confuse the experts – and maybe even this blog. Who knows?!