Study: Viking Teeth Were Groovy:
Viking warriors filed deep grooves in their teeth, and they likely had to smile broadly to show them off, according to new finds in four major Viking Age cemeteries in Sweden.Caroline Arcini of Sweden’s National Heritage Board analyzed 557 skeletons of men, women and children from between 800 and 1050 A.D. They discovered that 22 of the men bore deep, horizontal grooves across the upper front teeth.
“The marks are traces of deliberate dental modifications … they are so well-made that most likely they were filed by a person of great skill,” Arcini wrote in the current issue of the American Journal of Physical Anthropology.
Both Chris Rock and Bill Cosby are noted critics of what they see as systemic sophomoric tomfoolery in the “black community” which the metallic grill plays a role in.
Apparently the Vikings did something similar, although the dental work was a bit more permanent and probably a lot more painful. Damn that would hurt.