This book provides a detailed account of the comparative anatomy, development, homologies, and evolution of the head, neck, pectoral, and forelimb muscles of vertebrates. It includes hundreds of illustrations that show the homologies between the muscles of all the major extant vertebrate taxa and supplies a list of more than a thousand synonyms used by other authors to designate these muscles. It reviews data obtained in the fields of evolutionary developmental biology, molecular biology, and embryology, and explains how this data can help in understanding the evolution and homologies of vertebrate muscles.
