In this week's Claire chats video, Claire talks about tooth extractions, dentistry and how people cared for their teeth in Tudor times.
Notes, Sources and Further Reading
- Toni Mount's talk on Medieval Medicine can be enjoyed here
- John Strype's Historical collections of the life and acts of the Right Rev. Father in God, John Aylmer : Lord Bishop of London, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth can be read online at https://archive.org/details/historicalcollec00stryuoft
- http://www.historyundressed.com/2008/07/history-of-hygiene-bathing-teeth.html
- http://cookit.e2bn.org/historycookbook/32-339-tudors-Health-facts.html
- http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2013-05-27/horrible-histories-40-horrible-facts
- http://astar.tv/post/wait-that-used-to-be-a-thing-historical-medicine/
- http://www.livestrong.com/article/121752-toothache-remedies-using-whole-cloves/
Claire, your chat about Tudor dentistry was very interesting and I hope your own extractions proved to be not too painful or stressful. My dentist keeps a headset tuned to a pop music station on hand and once when I had to have some dental work done, I turned the headset on and and as soon as the dentist started to drill, the song “Bad to the Bone” started to play. We all had a good laugh about that. I was thinking about the crushed animal bones used on teeth. That would be a source of calcium, but I’m not sure if it would do any good just being applied to the teeth. I guess people have used these different remedies because something about them worked. Thanks for the chat!
Ha! How funny! I’m quite scared of the dentist because I had a bad experience when I was younger, but this dentist is really good with nervous patients. He gave me a mild sedative just to relax me and then he gives you stress balls to hold, a screen to watch wildlife programmes, and he does deep breathing. He also gave me a lesson on the difference between pain and pressure. It went really well and I’m healing fine, thank you. Just got to do the next two now.