number of periods in the
olden times. Surprising as it will seem to those who hear of it for the
first time, dentistry reached high perfection even in what we know as
ancient history. It is rather easy to trace scientific and craftsmanlike
interest in it during the medieval period and in the magnificent
development of surgery that came just at the end of the Middle Ages,
dentistry shared to such degree that some of the text-books of the
writers on surgery of this time furnish abundant evidence of
anticipations of many of the supposedly most modern developments of
dentistry.

There are a number of historical traditions with regard to dentistry and
the treatment of the teeth in Egypt that can be traced back to good
authorities in Egyptology of a generation or more ago, but it is rather
hard to confirm the accounts we have by actual specimens; either none
were found or for some reason those actually discovered are now not
readily available for study. Among the Phenicians however, though we
have good reasons to think that they learned their arts and crafts from
the Egyptians, there is convincing evidence of a high development of
dentistry. M. Ernest Renan, during an exploring expedition in Phenicia,
found in the old necropolis at Sidon a set of teeth wired together, two
of which were artificial. It was a striking example of bridgework, very
well done, and may now be seen in the Louvre. It would be more than a
little surprising, from what we know of the lack of inventiveness on the
part of the Phenicians and their tendency to acquire their arts by
imitation, if they had reached such a climax of invention by themselves.
Since they adapted and adopted most of their arts and crafts from Egypt,
with which they were in close commercial relations, it has been argued
with some plausibility that the Egyptians may have had many modes of
dental prosthesis, but removed all artificial teeth and dental
appliances from the mouth of corpses before embalming them, in
preparation for the next world, because there was some religious
objection to such human handiwork being left in place for the hereafter,
as they hoped for it.

There is a well-authenticated tradition of intimate intercourse in a
commercial way between the old Etruscans who inhabited the Italian hill
country and the Phenicians, so that it is no surprise to find that the
oldest of Etruscan tombs contain some fine examples of bridgework. An
improvement has come over Phenician w