‖ humerus Anat.
(ˈhjuːmərəs)
Pl. -i.
[L. (more correctly umerus) = shoulder, (rarely) upper arm.]
The bone of the upper arm, extending from the shoulder-joint to the elbow-joint; the homogenetic bone in other vertebrates.
| [1578 Banister Hist. Man iv. 51 b, The same bone in Latin is called Humerus, which in English is shoulder.] 1706 Phillips (ed. Kersey), Humerus, the Shoulder; the Shoulder-bone or first Bone of the Arm. 1727–41 Chambers Cycl. s.v., At the lower end of the humerus are two processes, covered each with a cartilage. 1851 Richardson Geol. viii. 295 Sockets for lodging the round head of the arm-bones, the humeri. 1875 Blake Zool. 89 The humerus is cylindrical, longest in Pelicans. |
b. Applied by Cuvier to the proscapula, by Owen to the mesocoracoid, of fishes.
| 1854 Owen in Circle Sc., Org. Nat. I. 176 In the salmon..The radius, after expanding to unite with the humerus, the ulna, and the radial carpals, sends a long and broad process downwards and inwards. |
c. The third joint of the anterior pair of legs of insects.
| 1826 Kirby & Sp. Entomol. III. 369 Humerus, the third and elongated joint of the Brachium, answering to the Femur in the legs. |
d. A corneous plate on the exterior front angle of the elytrum in Coleoptera.
| 1826 Kirby & Sp. Entomol. III. xxxv. 619 If you carefully extract one [wing] from the stag-beetle..the first thing that will strike you, upon examining the base, will be the plate..called by Chabrier the humerus. |
e. Applied by some to the anterior corner of the thorax, the ‘shoulder’, of an insect; by Walker, to the subcostal or submarginal vein of the forewing of certain Hymenoptera. (Cent. Dict.)