ABSTRACT
Because of their hardness, teeth are the most likely remains of an individual to endure through time. It is fortunate that teeth, which may be the only remains a forensic anthropologist or paleoanthropologist has to work with, preserve a wealth of information about the individuals of whom they were once a part. Teeth retain a record of their own growth in their hard tissues: the enamel, dentine, and cementum (Figure 4.1). In paleoanthropology, analysis of dental hard tissue growth has yielded major insights into the evolution of hominin growth patterns and life history (for a review see Dean, 2006). Disruptions in the growth of dental hard tissues have also revealed information about the experience of physiological stress in our hominin ancestors and relatives (reviewed in Guatelli-Steinberg, 2008). In forensic contexts, histological examination of the growth record preserved in dental hard tissues provides a means to reconstruct or estimate age at death (Hillson, 1996) to determine whether an infant survived after birth (Whittaker and Richards, 1978) and to identify periods of disturbed growth (Skinner and Anderson, 1991; Teivens et al., 1996).
