After branching off the maxillary artery in the infratemporal fossa, it runs through the foramen spinosum to supply the dura mater (the outer meningeal layer) and the calvaria.

In the dry cranium, the middle meningeal, which runs within the dura mater surrounding the brain, makes a deep groove in the calvarium.

It ascends between the sphenomandibular ligament and the lateral pterygoid muscle, and between the two roots of the auriculotemporal nerve to the foramen spinosum of the sphenoid bone, through which it enters the cranium; it then runs forward in a groove on the great wing of the sphenoid bone, and divides into two branches, anterior and posterior.

The anterior branch, the larger, crosses the great wing of the sphenoid, reaches the groove, or canal, in the sphenoidal angle of the parietal bone, and then divides into branches that spread out between the dura mater and internal surface of the cranium, some passing upward as far as the vertex, and others backward to the occipital region.

This article incorporates text in the public domain from page 560 of the 20th edition of Gray's Anatomy (1918) ocular group: central retinal