Sir, whilst it is very pleasing to see dentists taking an interest in those who treated teeth in the past, it would be even more so to see such interest placed within the wider context as, in this way, a much fuller and yet more interesting picture may be revealed.

Messrs Lynch, O'Sullivan and MacGillycuddy's paper on Fauchard (Pierre Fauchard: the 'Father of Modern Dentistry', BDJ 2006; 201: 779-781) represented much of the little we know of this most interesting man, mostly according to those old stalwarts Viau, Hoffman-Axthelm and the redoubtable Lilian Lindsay. Once again, we see Fauchard presented as a man standing out from the charlatans of the marketplace, the majority of whom were, by implication, doing bad dentistry. Step back a bit, however, and the view widens to show that those 'charlatans' were doing something completely different — the business of performing. And by performing in public, aided by accomplices, they would be able to sell their many drugs and cures for the toothache, and other aches besides.1 Whilst they were doing this, however, surgeons in France were treading very fresh ground – that of specialisation within surgery, an activity which has been well documented more recently by such historians as Toby Gelfand,2 Colin Jones and Lawrence Brockliss,3 among others. A wider appreciation will show that Fauchard was not an isolated 'dentist', rejecting the rough techniques of his fellow practitioners with only the best interests of the public in mind. He was, rather, a clever and shrewd surgeon with an eye to the promotion of his new knowledge amongst the fashionable and influential of France and, no doubt, the furthering of his career alongside other newly-focused surgeons. Just 20 years before the publication of Fauchard's book, the revered general surgeon Pierre Dionis had written in some detail on the operations for the teeth within his Cours d'opérations de Chirurgie,4 one of the last 'general' surgical books to do so. And at the same time that Fauchard was writing his surgical book on the teeth only, the surgeon Julien Clément was being ennobled by Louis XIV for delivering royal offspring, setting the scene for the 'explosive arrival' of the socially desirable man-midwife or accoucheur.5 The chevalier Taylor, holding a degree from Reims, was also specialising in cutting for the cataract by the 1730s, taking the title of opticien or oculiste. The shrewd Fauchard, the rags-to-riches dentiste, was not alone.