Temple (anatomy)

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Temple
Location of temple
Human skull. Temporal bone is orange, and the temple overlies the temporal bone as well as overlying the sphenoid bone.
Details
Artery	Superficial temporal artery
Vein	Superficial temporal vein
Identifiers
Latin	tempus
TA98	A01.1.00.004
TA2	103
FMA	46450
Anatomical terminology [edit on Wikidata]

The temple, also known as the pterion, is a latch where four skull bones fuse: the frontal, parietal, temporal, and sphenoid.^[1] It is located on the side of the head behind the eye between the forehead and the ear. The temporal muscle covers this area and is used during mastication.

Cladistics classify land vertebrates based on the presence of an upper hole, a lower hole, both, or neither in the cover of dermal bone that formerly covered the temporalis muscle, whose origin is the temple and whose insertion is the jaw.