There are two ways of naming things in anatomy, the highly complex way that creates unpronounceable words that only medicine connoisseurs understand and use, or the curious way that comes up with names that don’t really have much to do with the body, but that everyone automatically knows what they mean.
For this last category, have you ever wondered where these weird names came from and who thought that they would suit their designated body part? There surely has to be a reasonable explanation for each one of these, and here we’ve gathered all the background information you’ll love to know about and share with the next person you hear talking about them.
Cupid’s Bow
Makes sense that the high part of the lips, that gives them their “heart” shape has something to do with the Greek God of love and its distinctive weapon. If you put it into perspective, this middle dip could be seen as a bow; for a lot of people, bows are symbols of attractiveness, love, and even seduction. However, its real purpose is facilitating the movement of the lips for a better facial and verbal expression.
Adam’s apple
Possibly the best-known body reference out there that relies on the original biblical story about the origins of humankind. As the story tells, after Adam ate the forbidden fruit, a piece of it got stuck in his throat making it the perfect reference for how this male cartilage looks after puberty hits them.
Belly button
This part of the human body, that connected us to our mother’s placenta through the umbilical cord, is considered the first scar of our bodies. For some people, this scar creates a small “hole” in the middle of our bellies, and for others, how the skin recovers from the umbilical cut is by forming a little bump that looks like a skin button.
But the overall “belly button” concept wasn’t used until 1877 when men’s dress code turned out to be all about suits and suit vests that had an actual button where our birthmark commonly lays and, in that way, the term as such started making sense for further informal reference.
Musculature of Greek Gods
People from Ancient Greece loved to name things based on God’s attributes to honor them; those terms have strongly stuck with us over time. Such is the case of men and women musculature that from the very beginning has been a symbol of profound physical attractiveness, and therefore, it was attributed to their corresponding Gods.
When you think about the most attractive parts of human musculature, even nowadays, it could be said that the lower abs of both male and female bodies are one of the most appealing. For women, their lower back dimples are referred to as “dimples of Venus,” the goddess of beauty; whereas for men, that same part is attributed to Apollo, the divine representation of youth and masculine beauty.
Additionally to those two muscles, the male lower abs located on the hip bones are known as the iliac furrow or Adonis belt, alluding to the great beauty of this deity and the usual placement of belts in menswear.
There is no doubt that creativity is present in all aspects of human lives, and it could be quite fun to discover the stories of other terms just like these in different areas of our day-to-day lives that we would’ve never questioned otherwise.
