Anatomy study note · Head and neck

Dural venous sinuses

Venous channels where the endosteal and meningeal layers of the dura mater separate. They are lined by endothelium and have thick fibrous walls with no muscle and no valves. They receive blood from the brain, the diploë of the skull, the orbit and the internal ear, and most of it leaves through the internal jugular veins.

Key points

• Between endosteal and meningeal dura; no muscle, no valves.
• Superior sagittal → (right) transverse; inferior sagittal + great cerebral vein → straight → (left) transverse.
• Transverse → sigmoid → jugular foramen → IJV.
• Cavernous: ICA + VI inside; III, IV, V1, V2 in the wall.
• Dura (with its sinuses): mesoderm around the neural tube.

The full note in the atlas also covers

Features · Development · Clinical notes

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Written from

• Snell’s Clinical Anatomy by Regions, 10th ed., ch. 12, PDF pp. 1557–1560
• Inderbir Singh’s Human Embryology, ch. 17, PDF p. 321; ch. 20, PDF p. 372

More from the head and neck

• Epiglottis
• Ethmoid
• External carotid artery
• External ear
• External jugular vein
• External nose
• Eyelids and conjunctiva
• Facial bones of the orbit and nasal cavity
• Facial nerve
• Frontal bone
• Frontal lobe
• Genioglossus

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