jugular fossa

The jugular fossa is a deep depression in the inferior part of the base of the skull.

In the lateral part of the jugular fossa is the mastoid canaliculus for the entrance of the auricular branch of the vagus nerve.

The Jugular Wall or Floor is narrow, and consists of a thin plate of bone (fundus tympani) which separates the tympanic cavity from the jugular fossa.

Behind the jugular fossa is a quadrilateral area, the jugular surface, covered with cartilage in the fresh state, and articulating with the jugular process of the occipital bone.

In the bony ridge dividing the carotid canal from the jugular fossa is the small inferior tympanic canaliculus for the passage of the tympanic branch of the glossopharyngeal nerve.

It is possible for a disorder of more than cranial nerve to occur at the same time, if a trauma occurs at a location where many cranial nerves run together, such as the jugular fossa.

Its lateral half presents an excavation - the jugular fossa - which, with the jugular notch on the occipital, forms the jugular foramen; an eminence occasionally projects from the center of the fossa, and divides the foramen into two.

It arises from the jugular ganglion, and is joined soon after its origin by a filament from the petrous ganglion of the glossopharyngeal; it passes behind the internal jugular vein, and enters the mastoid canaliculus on the lateral wall of the jugular fossa.

It arises from the petrous ganglion, and ascends to the tympanic cavity through a small canal, the fossula petrosa/tympanic canaliculus, on the under surface of the petrous portion of the temporal bone on the ridge which separates the carotid canal from the jugular fossa.