Ligament · Hips

Transverse acetabular ligament

Ligamentum transversum acetabuli

A short band of strong fibres bridging the gap in the lower rim of the hip socket. It is really the stretch of rim where cartilage stops and fibre takes over: with the labrum it completes the ring around the head of the femur, and it turns the notch beneath into a closed opening. That opening is not incidental — vessels and nerves reach the interior of the joint through it, including the artery that runs on inside the ligament of the head of the femur.