Published in the British Dental Journal (2016), 221 (3), 137-140 1 ORTHODONTICS IN ANTIQUITY: MYTH OR REALITY R J Forshaw 1 ABSTRACT Malocclusion although a common finding in today’s world appears to have been less frequent in antiquity. There are references to overcrowding, delayed exfoliation of deciduous teeth and basic orthodontic treatment in the writings of classical authors such as Hippocrates, Celsus and Galen. However, early authentic archaeological finds of dental appliances are extremely rare. Considerable attention has focussed on gold banded devices excavated from ancient Etruscan sites in central Italy which have been dated to around the 7th-4th centuries BC, with a number of authors suggesting an orthodontic function for these appliances. This paper reviews the evidence for the possible treatment of malocclusions in antiquity and concludes that the use of orthodontic appliances to facilitate tooth movement is not supported by the available evidence. INTRODUCTION Malocclusion, and dental crowding in particular, is today a fairly frequent anomaly with estimates of population prevalence ranging between 30-60%, 1,2,3,4 although certain American studies report frequencies even higher at 70-80% 5,6 . From antiquity well preserved skulls are rare and so evidence for this condition is not readily available. However, Weinberger 7 indicated that Neanderthal man of 50,000-60,000 years ago had abnormalities in position and irregularities of the teeth as well as supernumerary, retained, unerupted and impacted teeth. Similarly, Begg 8 commented on the low incidence of tooth irregularity and crowding in prehistoric man. Andrik 9 considered that in the Palaeolithic Period dental crowding was a rare condition and in a study of a Bronze Age population he noted a prevalence of 1%. Sarig et al. 10 investigated a malocclusion in a well preserved Middle Palaeolithic skull (Qafzeh 9). 1 R J Forshaw LDS RCS(ENG), BChD, DGDP(UK), MSc, PhD Lecturer, KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology, Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, The University of Manchester/Dental Surgeon Correspondence to: Roger Forshaw Email: Roger.Forshaw@manchester.ac.uk