The muscular system is the anatomical system of a species that allows it to move.

The muscular system in vertebrates is controlled through the nervous system, although some muscles (such as the cardiac muscle) can be completely autonomous. Every muscle is supplied with blood vessels and lymphatics, and also with one or more nerves. The nerve supply is very important both from a medical and a morphological point of view. The approximate attachments are also important, because unless they are realized the action of the muscle cannot be understood, but the exact attachments are perhaps laid too great stress on in the anatomical teaching of medical students. The study of the actions of muscles is, of course, a physiological one, but teaching the subject has been handed over to the anatomists, and the results have been in some respects unfortunate. Until very recently the anatomist studied only the dead body, and his one idea of demonstrating the action of a muscle was to expose and then to pull it, and whatever happened he said was the action of that muscle. It is now generally recognized that no movement is so simple that only one muscle is concerned in it, and that what a muscle may do and what it really does do are not necessarily the same thing. As far as the deeper muscles are concerned, we still have only the anatomical method to depend upon, but with the superficial muscles it should be checked by causing a living person to perform certain movements and then studying which muscles take part in them.