Dante Depestel - Private Collection
Belgium
I classified this skull as male, the person died at a relatively old age (70+). This has been in the hands of a reputable collector for many years. Most of the front teeth were lost post mortem. The alveoli of the posterior molars have been closed for a long time. The bone loss is already advanced here. After tooth loss, bone loss initially proceeds very rapidly: in the first year, the bone recedes by half a millimeter to one millimeter, depending on the region of the jaw, and subsequently by about 0.1 to 0.4 millimeters per year. The skull is very well preserved and really wonderful to look at. On the right upper jaw above the canine tooth, a root abscess led to a natural opening of the maxilla. The fracture of the left mastoid process also occurred post mortem.
