The Digestive Tract develops from the primitive embryonic gut. This is divided into the fore gut, which produces the oesophagus, stomach, liver, pancreas and part of the small intestine, and the hindgut which produces the rest of the small intestine, the large intestine, the rectum and the bladder. During foetal life the developing gut spends part of its time outside the abdominal cavity, because it’s growing faster than the rest of the body. When the body catches up the gut returns, rotating as it does so, and the abdomen closes around the umbilicus.
During intra-uterine life the foetus swallows amniotic fluid - the fluid that fills the uterus and protects the baby (and often develops hiccoughs). Some of this fluid, together with mucous, dead cells and bile pigment, forms a sticky greenish substance called meconium, present in the bowel at birth - see the section covering pregnancy.
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