Navel-Gazing While High On Lidocaine
The other day, I suffered the discomfort and indignity of having to have a molar pulled. During the long wait, in which I perused the glossy ads at the front end of a Vanity Fair (would Helen of Troy have worn Michael Kors?), I constantly reassured myself that my trip to the dentist could have been a lot worse. If she ever needed a tooth pulled, Helen would have had some kick-ass opium, sure, but very little to counteract the risk of infection. Reminds me of an observation about Eric Shanower's graphic novel series Age of Bronze: Helen and Paris are the only ones with perfect teeth. Of course they are. The Beautiful People in every age are as blessed as they are conceited.
I needed three shots of Lidocaine to deaden my right jaw, one delivered straight under my tooth with horse-sized needle fitted with, my dentist assured me, the finest, most delicate tip available. Whatever you say. My jaw is still sore from that triple-whammy.
So out comes with tooth with a cracking sound I will remember to the grave. As soon as I'm able, I reach forward and pick up the specimen. I'm not squeamish about things like pulp and blood. My DNA is in that tooth, I think. Thousands of years from now some archaeologist could drill into that molar, process the pulp, and recreate my genome. Maybe they could tell me if my maternal ancestors got their Jewishness by way of the Near East or Central Asia; I suspect some of them were Khazars, many of whom resettled in Lithuania and Poland after the Khazar kingdom fell apart a thousand years ago.
I think about ancient remains, too. That skeleton of unknown sex from Anemospilia, crushed in the earthquake that brought down the shrine in 1700 B.C. Drilling a tooth might settle the question of whether the remains are male or female. It might settle, too, the speculation that the young man on the altar might have been the priest's son. We already know the priestess had poor dental hygiene; she was not a woman who brushed or flossed. Not that any of them had great dentistry, but her condition was such that it attracted notice. She would have had an epic case of halitosis while she lived.
I doubt there's money to spend doing DNA research on any remains from Anemospilia or Archanes, and no guarantee, either, that any usable DNA survived the fire that swept through collapsed building and blackened part of the sacrificial victim's bones.