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cramps

corrected for leg cramps

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For other uses, see Leg (disambiguation).

In general, a leg is any of the parts of an animal's body that support the rest of the body above the ground, and are used for locomotion.

Legs mostly come in even-numbered quantities that are characteristic of some taxonomic groups:

in vertebrates, 2 (the bipeds) or 4 (the quadrupeds);
in many familiar arthropods, 6, 8, or 12;
in some arthropods, more than a dozen and sometimes over 100 -- but despite what their names might suggest,
- centipedes seldom have exactly a hundred, and
- millipedes apparently never even approach a thousand.

In most quadrupeds and bipeds, legs consist of two main parts, attached to the body at one end, and to the foot at the other, and jointed at the knee.

The human leg

Main article: Human leg

The bones of the human leg are:

the femur (or thighbone), which attaches to the pelvis
the patella (kneecap)
the tibia (shinbone)
the fibula (calf bone)

The front edge of the tibia is not covered by a thick layer of muscle or fat: this is why being kicked in the shins is so painful.

Why do horses' knees bend backwards?

Although some quadrupeds such as horses appear to have reverse-bending knees on their back legs, the apparent backwards-bending knee is actually the equivalent of an ankle joint, with the entire lower leg being part of the "foot", and the apparent ankle being the equivalent of a finger joint. The actual "true" knee joint, the stifle joint is internal to the horse's body, and bends in the same direction as other knees.

searchspell:

cramps

corrected for leg cramps

The human leg

Why do horses' knees bend backwards?

See also