Galen, about 150 A.D., taught that teeth were true bones and that the canine teeth should be called "eye" teeth, because they were supplied by a branch of the optic nerve. Aëtius, 300 A.D., apparently discovered the foramina at the roots of the teeth through which the nerves enter. In Rome false teeth and sets of teeth constructed of ivory and fastened with gold wire existed as early as the Laws of the XII Tables, and before the days of Roman civilization it is known that the Etruscans were skilled in manipulation of gold within the mouth, while your dean has described and has, I believe, in his possession beautiful examples of Etruscan work of this kind. Among the Arabs, after the Arabian domination of the then civilized world, attention was paid to the teeth, although this was considered a very inferior part of the physician's work. Among these Arabians much later, and in spite of their study of Greek writers and their translations from the Greek, there may still be met such passages as{332} this from Garriopontus, 1045 A.D.: "On the island of Delphi a painful molar tooth, which was extracted by an inexperienced physician, occasioned the death of a philosopher, for the marrow of the tooth, which originates from the brain, ran down into the lungs and killed that philosopher." For all that I know, this is the first record of a death after extraction of a tooth. Albucassis, 1100 A.D., gave directions for replacing lost teeth by natural or ivory substitutes. For centuries extraction of teeth had been and was considered a critical and dangerous operation, although itinerant quacks drew them without hesitation. The Roman poets and satirists made many allusions, in their day, to the teeth and to operations performed upon them.