the.com/tooth
the only part of you that can't heal itself, yet outlasts everything else you are
means One of the hard, white, bony structures set in the jaws, used for biting and chewing.
from From Old English 'tōþ', going back to a Proto-Germanic root that also gave German 'Zahn' and Dutch 'tand'. Further back lies the Proto-Indo-European root *dent-/*dont-, the same source that surfaces in Latin 'dens, dentis' (hence 'dental') and Greek 'odous'. So the homely English 'tooth' and the clinical 'dentist' are distant cousins, both gnawing at the same ancient word.
- hardest tissue
- enamel is the toughest substance your body makes
- no repair
- unlike bone, damaged enamel never grows back
- survives you
- teeth outlast flesh, naming the dead in graves
- baby stash
- adult teeth wait hidden in the jaw for years
- ancient ledger
- isotopes in enamel reveal where someone grew up
lucy's tooth — 3.2 million year old hominin molar from ethiopia, one of the most famous fossils ever discovered
george washington's dentures — false teeth made from hippopotamus ivory and human teeth, worn by the first u.s. president