[MR] History Blog: Oldest Scottish Dental Bridge

[Garth Groff and Sally Sanford]

Noble friends, especially fellow Scots,

If you think going to the dentist is painful, imagine the agony of the
possibly-medieval Scot who had a gold wire applied to his teeth.

The sufferer is known only from his mandible, showing he had advanced
dental decay, plus the gold wire bridging a gap between two of his teeth.
The wire was either to stabilize his remaining teeth after one was lost, or
was intended to hold in a now-lost implant.

The jawbone was one of many uncovered when a graveyard in Aberdeen was
cleared for "redevelopment" in 2006 at St. Nicholas Kirk. Some 900 intact
skeletons were evicted from their supposedly eternal rest, and a huge
number of disarticulated bones like this mandible were also found. The date
of his burial is rather vaguely estimated to have been as early as 1460 and
as late as 1670.

To have afforded this treatment, and indeed to have been buried in this
upscale parish cemetery, indicates the man was well off, at least
financially -- but certainly not in the dental hygiene department during
that pre-flossing era. Ouch!

The story is found at https://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/75943 .

Mungo Napier, Laird of Mallard Lodge  🦆
Continuing a crusade to keep the original Merry Rose relevant and in
business.