The malleus, or hammer, is a hammer-shaped small bone or ossicle of the middle ear.

The bone continues as the handle (or manubrium) of malleus, which connects to the tympanic membrane.

[1] Between the neck and handle of the malleus, lateral and anterior processes emerge from the bone.

[4][5] The first brief written description of the malleus was by Berengario da Carpi in his Commentaria super anatomia Mundini (1521).

[6] Niccolo Massa's Liber introductorius anatomiae[7] described the malleus in slightly more detail and likened both it and the incus to little hammers terming them malleoli.