Today, going to the dentist is like spending the day at the beach when compared to thousands of years ago. Today you walk into the office wait for your turn rest your head on a padded headrest. The ancient people were not so lucky; they had to endure severe pains from toothaches and teeth extractions using brutal force. Dentistry is one of the oldest related medical profession, which dates a far back as 7000 B.C. Indus Valley civilization. It’s a closely related field to medicine and is the study of the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of disorders and diseases of the oral cavity (teeth and mouth tissues) and supporting structures.
However, dentistry includes correction of malformed jaws, alignment of the teeth and treatment of birth abnormalities like cleft palate. Moreover, description of dentistry (tooth decay) was not available until 5000 B.C.; in a Sumerian text at the same time, it claimed tooth worm was the cause of tooth decay until 1700. Aristotle and Hippocrates in ancient Greece wrote on dentistry – ‘How to Treat Decaying Teeth’ – even so, the first book on dentistry (The Little Medicinal Book of All Kinds of Diseases and Infirmities of the Teeth) published in 1530.
Early Dentistry
Clearly, in ancient times there was some form of dentistry in practice, but certainly with scary looking tools that inflicted lots of pain to the patients. Some Egyptian mummy skulls dating back to 2750 BCE have small holes in the jaw in place of the tooth roots; believed to drain abscesses. Furthermore, the earliest attempt to replace a tooth dates to 600 BCE in Phoenicia (modern-day Lebanon); animal teeth were used to replace missing teeth and held in place with cords.
In general, restorative dentistry (replacing or filling of teeth) and prosthetics began in Etruscan (modern-day Central and Northern Italy). The Etruscan’s took basic dentistry to an artistic level, they were intelligent people, who delight in luxury and increased their knowledge of dentistry from their sea travels and trades. Consequently, they experimented with teeth filling using gold in 700 B.C. and with artificial teeth implants from animals were held with gold bands. Besides that, dental partial dentures and dental bridges of gold dating about 500 BCE were found in Etruscan tombs.
The Roman's adopted Etruscan dentistry after they conquered them. Assuredly, the eastern world had some early dentistry but, with a different history. Historical evidence shows that the early Chinese people practiced restorative dentistry using silver amalgam as filling. Nevertheless, dentistry has evolved over time, from a barbaric practice to a technologically advanced one.
Egyptian dentistry
Egypt is one of the origins of ancient civilizations, ancient Egyptians were very knowledgeable in many areas of science (dentistry), art and were comfortable about the human body. In addition, for Egyptians to mummify bodies, they required an understanding of the human anatomy. Egyptian doctors wrote manuals on how to treat wounds, cure bites and mend bones. Evidence of dentistry in Egypt was found in one of such manuals (as old as the first pyramids). However, the earliest evidence of dental surgery in Egypt was in 3000 and 2500 B.C. and was by drilling the teeth or the cavities.
Ancient Egyptian’s suffered from one particular dental problem, due to their diet, grains for bread were ground on rough stones and small stones got into the dough for bread. This made the bread hard to eat regularly without dental problems.
Pain from ancient dental surgeries was excruciating but, by 1550 B.C. Egyptians had dental pain prescriptions. Finally, one striking discovery in Egyptian dentistry was the absence of any form of artificial teeth, to replace missing front teeth despite their intelligence and lavish lifestyle.
Roman Dentistry
Like I pointed out earlier, the Romans learned much of their culture and medicine from Etruscan’s who implanted gold fillings and gold prosthetics. Roman dentists used scary clamps and drills to remove teeth’s; opium was their pain medication for dentistry. Also, the Romans were well aware of oral hygiene and had healthy teeth’s due to their diet. Roman dentists replaced missing teeth’s and extracted teeth’s only when it could not be treated.
Dark Ages Dentistry
The middle age (5th – 15th century AD) called the dark ages of dentistry, toothache was prevalent and people suffered a lot. In addition, the treatment at that time was brutal, as the teeth were forcefully and brutally pulled out. Though evidence shows that powders, toothpaste, and mouthwash for halitosis existed then, sugar was also a luxury and most people relied on natural sugar from honey and fruits. During this period the first dentist was in Egypt in 2600 B.C. and monks in Europe had a good education and practiced medicine.
With time, the Pope stopped Monks from dentistry and allowed barbers to take over the task because barbers helped Monks with surgery. Barbers had skills with knives and razor and in 1300’s, the tools used for dentistry were triceps and pelican (made of metal, inflicts pains and causes damage to the gum).
Present day dentistry
Thanks to technology, present day dentistry has had innumerable advances in its procedures and types of equipment. These have made dentistry treatments and restorations faster, easier and affordable. One of the most significant contributions of dentistry technological advancement is making dentophobic patients comfortable to receive dental care and surgeries. The excruciating pain in ancient dentistry is almost completely eliminated. Clearly, present day dentistry has created room for specialization of dentist in various areas.
You can imagine what our ancestors suffered and try to appreciate the sacrifices made over the years to get to where we are today.