Background : Osteoporosis has been suggested to be associated with cardiovascular disease. Although the associations between osteoporosis or osteopenia and arterial stiffness have been well documented, it is not clear whether they co-progress from the early stages through common mechanisms. Thus, we measured brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV), which reflects arterial stiffness, and bone mineral density (BMD), analyzed their association in a general population. Methods : Data from 1890 subjects among 2012 subjects sampled from a general population in a rural area in Korea were analyzed. baPWV was measured with the use of automatic waveform analysis (VP-2000; Colin Medical Technology Co., Komaki, Japan) and BMD was measured by the calcaneal quantitative ultrasound method using the Sahara Clinical Bone Sonometer (Hologic Inc., Waltham, MA, USA). We evaluated the influence of age, gender, menopausal state, and established cardiovascular risk factors on this association. Results : Age of the subjects was 60.7짹10.4 years. Males were 38.0% (n=718). In a simple correlation analysis, BMD negatively correlated with baPWV in both genders, but more prominent correlation in females (r = -0.29, p < 0.0001) than in males (r = -0.07, p < 0.05). In a multivariate analysis, baPWV was significantly associated with BMD independent of age, blood pressure, body mass index, fasting blood glucose and conventional atherosclerotic risk factors in females (beta = -201.75, p < 0.001) but was not significantly associated with BMD in males Conclusion : These results suggest that decreased BMD is associated with arterial stiffness, and between the both, common or related mechanisms existed in the early stages