Archaeologists Find Earliest Dental Prosthesis In Medieval Tomb

 

 

 

It looks like a team of archeologists from University of Pisa in Italy have found what might be the earliest RPD (removable partial denture) in history.  It consists of a lower left canine and 4 mandibular incisors all attached to a band of metal.  The fascinating and yet terrifying part of the story is that the teeth are not the teeth of the body that was discovered.  You read that right.  These 5 teeth were somehow acquired from another human and then placed in the mouth of a separate human.

 

Here is the full story from the Daily Mail:

 

 

Ancient', 'green', or 'borrowed from other people' aren't descriptors many of us would want used to describe our pearly whites.

 

But all three are apt for a set of dentures unearthed from a chapel in Italy, which could date back to the time of Leonardo Da Vinci.

 

Archaeologists believe the prosthesis, which is made from a string of human teeth and a strip of metal, could date back as far as the 14th century - making them one of the only sets from the Renaissance period to be found.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3946912/Are-oldest-dentures-Europe-Gruesome-14th-century-device-teeth-dead-humans.html#ixzz4R8c5qPrg 
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According to English language Italian news website, The Local, the dentures were uncovered during a dig in Lucca in Italy, in the bottom layers of a tomb.

A team from the University of Pisa unearthed the Renaissance false teeth while excavating a family tomb in 2010 where hundreds of skeletons are buried in the chapel of San Francesco.

The site was the tomb for the Guinigi family, an aristocratic group of powerful bankers and traders who governed the city, with generations of Guinigi's buried atop one another.

Dental implants have been recorded as far back as the ancient Egyptians, with Romans and Etruscans also showing signs of having dental work done to fill the gaps.

The first porcelain dentures didn't arrive until the late 18th century, so animal teeth, human teeth, bone, ivory and other tough surfaces were trialled.