Anatomical terms are the vocabulary of medicine. Anatomy began as
a descriptive science in the days when Latin was the universal scientific
language. Early anatomists described the structures they saw in that
language, comparing them to common and familiar objects, or borrowing
terms from the Greek and Arabic masters before them. In anatomic terminology,
common Latin or Greek words are used as such for any part of the body for
which the ancients had a name. For many other structures, scientific names
have been invented either by using certain classical words which appear to
be descriptive of the part concerned, or commonly, by combining Greek or
Latin roots to form a new compound term. Memorization of such terms without
understanding their meaning can lead to mental indigestion.

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