ABSTRACT
A prodigious literature, dating from the late seventeenth century, exists on cheiridial muscles in nonhuman primates, particularly in the apes. Systematic quantitative studies on muscles in nonhuman primates have lagged notably behind mensural and statistical studies on bones which were pioneered and executed most comprehensively by Schultz. The chapter considers some problems that certain physiological factors pose in the use of data on muscle mass. It discusses features of relative muscle mass, emphasizing muscle groups that are involved in manual and pedal prehension, in order to illustrate the comparative strategy and synthetic approach. The chapter presents three set of ratios: ratios that compare selected groups of muscles in the hand with those in the foot; ratios that compare selected groups of muscles within the forearm or hand; and ratios that compare selected groups of muscles within the leg or foot.
