[ Previous ][Contents][ Next ]

The excavations of the 5th and 4th century Phoenician rock tombs, which unearthed the second known specimen of Phoenician dental art, were conducted by the American School of Oriental Research of Jerusalem during the early months of 1901.(14) The site of the excavations was an open field approximately a mile south-east of the city of Sidon in southern Lebanon, and just east and in full view of the necropolis from which the Gaillardot specimen was taken.

Through the kindness of Dr. Ingholt, the Director of the Museum of Archaeology, of the American University of Beirut, it has recently been the writer's privilege not only to view this astounding bit of dental art(15) but to hold it in his own hands and to thoroughly examine it from a dentist's viewpoint. It is, therefore, an added pleasure to be able to sketch(16) and describe this specimen for the readers of the first Archaeological Annual of the University. In view of the great indebtedness the University feels toward the late Dr. and Mrs. Ford, by whose will the appliance came under their care, it shall be a privilege to hereafter refer to it as "The Ford Specimen of Retentive Prosthesis." It was found attached to the anterior teeth of the lower jaw of a male skeleton which was recovered from a massive anthropoid sarcophagus (plate I 11). (17) Archaeologists state that this sarcophagus had remained unopened since the day of interment, probably early in the 5th century B.C. (18)


Fig. 5

The object of a retentive prosthetic appliance even today is to hold natural dental organs in their natural positions when otherwise they would have succumbed to the ravages of wasting diseases. A disease of this nature very frequently met in modern dental practices is Pyorrhea Alveolaris, in which there is a wasting away of the bone surrounding the teeth. Recent X-ray of the Ford mandible reveals the

14. Torrey, The Annual of the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem, New Haven 1920, 1, p. 1-27.
15. First described by Torrey, op. cit. p. 14-15, figs. 14-15.
16. The drawings reproduced on pages 24-26 have 		    been made by Puzant Halebian, class 193.5, A.U.B. Dental Department.
17. Cf. Torrey, op. cit. p. 20, fig. 18, sarcophagus no. 8. The photographs reproduced on plate 111 are due to the kindness of Emir Chehab, Director of the National Museum in Beirut.
18.Op. cit. P. 15.

[ Previous ][Contents][ Next ]
Created by the Digital Documentation Center at AUB in collaboration with Al Mashriq of Høgskolen i Østfold, Norway.

980519 pas - Email: hseeden@aub.edu.lb