What Did Ancient Humans Do About Toothache?

What Did Ancient Humans Do About Toothache? What did ancient humans do when they had a toothache? No dentists, no painkillers, no metal tools — and yet people were fighting tooth pain for tens of thousands of years. In this video, we travel back through the strange, painful and surprisingly clever history of Stone Age dentistry: Neanderthal toothpicks, natural painkillers hidden in ancient plaque, a 14,000-year-old tooth scraped clean with flint, the world's oldest filling made of tar and hair, drills borrowed from bead-makers, and the mysterious "tooth worm" people believed in for over 3,000 years. And at the end — why your fear of the dentist's chair might be one of the oldest feelings you have. 📚 SOURCES Frayer et al. (2017) — toothpick grooves on Neanderthal teeth from Krapina, Croatia Weyrich et al. (2017), Nature — Neanderthal dental plaque DNA from El Sidrón, Spain Humphrey et al. (2014), PNAS — cavities in hunter-gatherers at Taforalt, Morocco Oxilia et al. (2015), Scientific Reports — flint scraping of a cavity at Villabruna, Italy Oxilia et al. (2017), American Journal of Physical Anthropology — bitumen fillings at Riparo Fredian, Italy Coppa et al. (2006), Nature — drilled molars from Mehrgarh, Pakistan Bernardini et al. (2012), PLoS ONE — beeswax filling from Slovenia If you enjoyed this, check out our previous video: What Did Ancient Humans Do For Pleasure? #ancienthistory #pleasure #ancient #stickman #stickmananimation #history #historyfacts #historydocumentary #sciencefacts #ancienthumans #prehistory #stoneage #dentistry