Dentalium, c1745-1807

Description

Glass specie jar, with glass lid and paper contents label, containing specimens of tooth shell (Dentalium elephantinum). From the Burges Collection.

Dentalium elephantinum may be the particular species known and prized by apothecaries as the ‘true’ tooth shell, though other more common species were often substituted.

Text on paper contents label reads ‘Catal. mat. med. p. 114. No. 35. Dentalium Elephantinum.’

Pomet, in his Compleat History of Druggs, says that the dog-like tooth-shell ‘is an Alcali, to be us’d as other testaceous Powders’.