Teeth are quiet witnesses. They form early, endure long after soft tissues decay, and lock away chemical and microscopic traces of how a person grew up and what they ate. In a new study from Pontecagnano in southern Italy, archaeologists used teeth to tell a story that unfolds over a lifetime, not just at death.
Published in PLOS One,1 the research by Roberto Germano and colleagues reconstructs childhood stress, adult diet, and everyday resilience in an Iron Age community that lived nearly 2,700 years ago. What emerges is not a grand historical narrative, but something more intimate. A glimpse of individual lives shaped by food, illness, and change.
