The Library Remembers When...

From the Ipswich Tribune December 19, 1929 edition

Early Substitutes for the Modern Toothbrush

Toothbrushes are quite a modern invention. In the Vernel Memoirs we are told that in 1649, Sir Ralph Verney was asked by a friend to inquire in Paris “for the little brushes for making cleane of the teeth, most covered with sylver, and some few with gold and sylver Twiste, together with some Pettits Bouettes (? Boites) to put them in.” There is another reference to these, in a later volume of the Mehoirs, as “teeth brushes.”

“Turkish toothbrush” occurs in a list of “utensile” in the Musaeum Trade sca...