Strap muscles

Infrahyoid muscles
Muscles of the neck seen from the front. The infrahyoid muscles are coloured in violet.
Details
Nerve	Ansa cervicalis
Actions	Depress the hyoid bone
Identifiers
Latin	Musculi infrahyoidei
Dorlands /Elsevier	m_22/12549354
TA	A04.2.04.001
FMA	71298
Anatomical terms of muscle []

The infrahyoid muscles (strap muscles) are a group of four pairs of muscles in the anterior (frontal) part of the neck. The four infrahyoid muscles are: the sternohyoid, sternothyroid, thyrohyoid and omohyoid muscles.

The infrahyoid muscles either originate from or insert on to the hyoid bone.

The term infrahyoid refers to the region below the hyoid bone, while the term strap muscles refers to the long and flat muscle shapes which resembles a strap. The stylopharyngeus muscle is considered by many to be one of the strap muscles, but is not an infrahyoid muscle.

The origin, insertion and innervation of the individual muscles:

All of the infrahyoid muscles are innervated by the ansa cervicalis from the cervical plexus (C1-C3) except the thyrohyoid muscle, which is innervated by fibers only from the first cervical spinal nerve travelling with the hypoglossal nerve.

The infrahyoid muscles function to depress the hyoid bone and larynx during swallowing and speech.