To afford support and maintain the three artificial teeth in position, the Etruscan dentist of about three thousand years ago, ingeniously made use of the canine and the lateral incisor on the right, the canine, the first bicuspid, and the first molar on the left, connecting them by a continuous series of pure gold rings soldered together. The dentist had not employed human teeth to replace the incisors which the individual had lost; according to the religious laws of the time, the dead were held sacred, and it would probably have been considered sacrilege to use their teeth; or it may also be that the patient had declared his aversion to the idea of substituting his own teeth by those of a dead man. However this may be, the Etruscan dentist thought well to replace the missing incisors with a somewhat large ox tooth; upon this he had made a groove, so as to give it the appearance of two teeth. In reality this ox tooth occupies the place not only of the two middle incisors, but also of the lateral incisor on the left. Perhaps by a natural anomaly the individual may never have had this tooth; or, more probably still, some length of time may have elapsed between the loss of one of the three and the other two, so that when he made up his mind to have recourse to a prosthetic appliance, the space normally occupied by the three incisors was already notably diminished, and the void could therefore be filled by an ox tooth so adjusted as to represent only two teeth. [Illustration: FIG. 16 Etruscan appliance for supporting three artificial teeth, two of which were made of one ox tooth. (Civic Museum of Corneto.)] [Illustration: FIG. 17 The same appliance reversed.] When I was intrusted with the reproduction of all the ancient prosthetic pieces existing in the Italian museums, I met with special difficulty in the reproduction of the above-mentioned piece; and this because I could not succeed in procuring an ox tooth that was not worn away by the effects of mastication. The idea then occurred to me of sectioning the upper jaw of a calf at about the age of the second dentition, and taking out the teeth, which were already strong and well formed, but not yet deteriorated by mastication. I fancy my Etruscan colleague must have done the same three thousand years ago, when he carried out the prosthesis in question, for the large tooth employed by him does not show any signs of being worn by mastication.