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Why Did This Wealthy Scotsman Pay a Jeweler to Wrap His Teeth in Gold Wire Hundreds of Years Ago?

What an early example of a dental bridge reveals about health, wealth and social values in the late medieval and early modern world

Sonja Anderson | Daily Correspondent

May 8, 2026 5:32 p.m.

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Researchers have identified Scotland’s oldest dental bridge, and it’s rather flashy. The twisted piece of wire, attached to the jaw of a man from the late medieval or early modern period, is made of 20-karat gold. According to a study recently published in the British Dental Journal, the bridge was drawn between the man’s lower front teeth, either securing a loose incisor or holding a false tooth in its place.

The mandible in question was found two decades ago, during an archaeological excavation at St. Nicholas Kirk, an 11th- or 12th-century church in Aberdeen, Scotland. In 2006, ahead of construction, excavators pulled out about 900 human skeletons and nearly four tons of loose bones. Recently, the remains have been reassessed, “as part of a larger research project focused on temporal health trends throughout Scotland,” per the study.

Out of 100 assessed remains from the early modern period, only one had clear evidence of dental work. The man who donned the device died between 1460 and 1670 C.E. His mandible is about 70 percent complete, with nine attached teeth. Four other teeth detached after death, one was lost before death, and the researchers aren’t sure whether the wisdom teeth ever developed. From the jawbone and teeth’s development, traits and wear patterns, the researchers concluded the deceased was an adult male who died in middle age.

“An examination of the teeth reveals that this individual had poor oral health,” write the researchers. Multiple teeth sport minor and major “carious lesions.” And all the teeth were covered in minor amounts of tartar.

The most “noteworthy feature” of this mandible, though, is of course the fine gold wire, per the study. Dental ligatures are rare finds in archaeology, and few found examples in Europe predate the 17th century. Because the Aberdeen gold wire indented the teeth it touched, the researchers believe the man wore it for “a substantial period of time” before he died. 

People have been performing dental work for millennia, absent Colgate or lidocaine. Up to 9,000 years ago, Neolithic people drilled into each other’s molars in what’s now Pakistan. Some 6,500 years ago in Slovenia, someone filled a broken canine with beeswax. And one set of ancient Egyptian teeth, dating back to around 2500 B.C.E., sport a gold wire not unlike the Scotsman’s. Dubbed the “El-Quatta dental bridge,” this wire likely acted as a miniature prosthesis, holding in place a false tooth. It may have been installed after death, to “complete” the body before its burial.

In Scotland hundreds of years ago, dental practitioners were barbers, craftsmen, barber-surgeons or dentatores—people who specialized in teeth. According to the study, local women administered most health care, including pulling teeth. Alternatively, those suffering from a rotten tooth could wait for the services of a “tooth-drawer,” a traveling carnival performer peddling “painless” extractions. Some old written records from Scotland describe folk practices like applying hot green turf to aching teeth and rubbing a poultice of cow dung onto oral abscesses.

But the lack of modern dental knowledge might not have been as troublesome as you’d imagine. In 2022, Polish dentist Marta Szymańska-Pawelec examined six skulls from late medieval Poland, and her team found them to be in good condition. “It is not surprising if we look at the diet,” Szymańska-Pawelec told Science in Poland’s Anna Gumułka. “Centuries ago, people consumed unprocessed or low-processed products: cereals, bread, smoked meats, vegetables and fruits. Refined sugar was a luxury and very expensive commodity.”

Still, many late medieval and early modern people devoted time and care to their oral hygiene. Other examples of treatments included “dentures made of human teeth or cow bone. … There were liquids to whiten teeth, methods of removing calculus (plaque) and compounds for filling cavities,” as osteo-archeologist Trevor Anderson told BBC News’ Jane Elliott in 2004. Cleanliness and health were marks of social status and virtue. “As such, the social importance of an individual's smile encouraged those who were able to afford [dental] treatments to seek them out,” write the researchers.

According to the study, this Scotsman was likely upper-class, judging by his burial place. This meant that he could afford a skilled jeweler and gold—as well as, possibly, a sugary diet that damaged his teeth. The man’s wire bridge may have been functional, but it probably also served a cosmetic purpose, the researchers write.

These practices may illuminate a historic path toward modern dentistry, but medieval practitioners had a long way to go. According to Anderson’s 2004 paper on medieval English dentistry, when it came to dire maladies like oral cancer, a prevailing method of treatment was, simply, prayer.

Sonja Anderson | Read More

Sonja Anderson is a writer and reporter based in Chicago.