Ligament · Hand

Distal intercarpal ligaments

Short, very stiff bands binding the four bones of the far carpal row — trapezium, trapezoid, capitate and hamate — to one another on the palm side, on the back, and in the gaps between the bones themselves. They are what makes that row behave as a single block rather than four independent bones. The block is the fixed foundation the metacarpals are bolted onto, so nearly everything we call wrist motion happens above it: between the two carpal rows, and between the proximal row and the radius. It is also why the far row is described as the immobile part of a joint complex that is otherwise unusually mobile.