A popular essay on the structure, formation, and management of the teeth ... / by John Fuller.

  • Fuller, John, active 1810.
Date:
1810
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A popular essay on the structure, formation, and management of the teeth ... / by John Fuller. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    I the brown are generally too soft, and soon wear down. Its thickness is likewise ▼cry various; in some, the enamel forms the greatest part of the teeth 3 then the edges of the front teeth appear dark ; this is owing to its transparency, and darkness of the mouth, and not any defect in the enamel itself. In others, the enamel is very thin, which, on using any gritty tooth powder? is soon rubbed off, and the bony substance exposed to decay. The formation ofa tooth is briefly thus; asmall membraneous capsula is first discovered lying in a grove on the jaw, where the subsequent tooth is in- tended to stand, and very closely attached to the in- ternal substance of the gums. The vessels which enter the bottom of the capsula deposit in it a substance similar to jelly; this is termed the pulp of the tooth; and at first is very small; it however increases till it has attained the full size and shape of the body of the tooth that it is intended to form. When it has arrived at this stage, the internal gclatineous substance, which js extremely vascular, deposits, or rather, seems convert- ed, on its most prominent points or edges, into an osseous matter, which is at first soft and elastic, but hardens by degrees into the bony substance described above ; this bony deposit, or more properly ossification, extends till the whole external surface next to the capsula, or covering, is formed into a complete shell, possessing all the prominences and depressions of the body of the tooth. Layer within layer is successively added, till the whole is converted into a solid compact bony sub- V