🪴 GoDeep
Search
← University Challenge
Portrait of Adductor magnus

Anatomy · Muscles

Adductor magnus

Largest of the adductors, part hamstring

Lower limb · thigh, medial compartment

Adductor magnus is the large, triangular muscle of the inner thigh, the biggest and most powerful of the adductors. It is a hybrid: its adductor part is supplied by the obturator nerve and its hamstring part by the tibial nerve. The gap between its two insertions, the adductor hiatus, lets the femoral vessels pass to the back of the knee.

How to spot them

  • ▸Broad triangular sheet on the inner thigh, deepest and largest of the adductor group
  • ▸Fibres fan out from the pubic and ischial rami to the whole length of the femur
  • ▸Lower tendon ends on the adductor tubercle of the femur
  • ▸A gap, the adductor hiatus, lies between its femoral attachments

What to know

The largest of the adductor muscles, a triangular sheet on the inner thigh

Adductor magnus.

A muscle with a dual nerve supply: the obturator nerve to one part and the tibial part of the sciatic nerve to the other

Adductor magnus — adductor part and hamstring part.

The muscle whose lower attachment on the adductor tubercle of the femur leaves a gap through which the femoral vessels pass to the back of the knee

Adductor magnus — the adductor hiatus.

Its 'hamstring part' arises from the ischial tuberosity and helps extend the hip

Adductor magnus.

It adducts the thigh, giving power in squeezing the legs together, as when gripping a saddle

Adductor magnus.

It inserts along the linea aspera and the medial supracondylar line of the femur

Adductor magnus.

Key ideas

  • It is a composite muscle: the adductor part acts like the other adductors, the hamstring part acts like a hamstring, which explains the two nerve supplies.
  • The adductor hiatus transmits the femoral artery and vein into the popliteal fossa, where they are renamed popliteal.

Quick-fire facts

  • •Origin: inferior pubic ramus, ischial ramus and ischial tuberosity.
  • •Insertion: gluteal tuberosity, linea aspera and medial supracondylar line (adductor part); adductor tubercle of the femur (hamstring part).
  • •Nerve supply: obturator nerve (posterior division) for the adductor part; tibial part of the sciatic nerve for the hamstring part.
  • •Actions: adducts the thigh; the hamstring part extends the hip.
  • •The adductor hiatus lies between the two insertions and transmits the femoral vessels to the popliteal fossa.
  • •It is the largest and most powerful of the adductor group.
  • •Adductor tubercle, the knob on the medial femoral condyle, is its lowest attachment.

Drill it — 6 cards

1 / 6new card

Sources