You may recognize this image. It’s the emblem of dentistry. Ever wonder if there’s more to this image than meets the eye? There certainly is!
The Triangle and Circle:
There are two Greek letters found in this image: Delta and Omicron. Delta is the triangle, representing dentistry. Omicron for Odont (tooth) is firmly interwoven with Delta. The official color of Dentistry, lilac, vibrantly fills omicron. Lilac was chosen as the color of dentistry in 1897 by the National Association of Dental Faculties.
The Leaves and Berries:
Look carefully at the background and you will notice Situs Slot Pragmatic to leaves and berries. This image has 32 leaves and 20 berries. The 32 leaves are to represent the 32 teeth in our permanent dentition. You guessed it: the 20 berries equate to the 20 primary teeth.
The Snake:
The focal point of this image is a serpent wrapped around a cautery. The serpent, although poison-bearing and sly, subsumes Grecian and Biblical representations of health.
The Greeks held that Asclepius slithered into a serpent to heal the people suffering from the Roman plague that covered the land. The image you see above represents the Rod of Asclepius.
Serpent representations of health are consistent in the Old Testament as well. The Bible reads: “Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived.” (Numbers 21:9)
So, you see, the emblem bears a much deeper meaning than a simple glance would Slot88 Gacor. Since 1965, this emblem has represented dentistry when the American Dental Association (ADA) deemed this the official emblem. Upon further inspection, the emblem is long-rooted in history and symbolism to represent our profession.
~Courtney Worlinsky, Florida ’14
This is so interesting and well written!
Great blog post Courtney!
Courtney Worlinsky thank you for an amazing blog. I really wish you would publish this in the Dentaltown magazine and website. Would you consider it? I am 51 years old and I have never known any of this before but have always wondered.
Howard Farran DDS, MBA
Founder & CEO of Dentaltown
[email protected]
Wow this is fascinating, Courtney.
The symbolism in many of these emblems is so easily lost on most of us in the practice, so this is a really great post. After all, someone took the time to think of all of this meaning and include these symbols, yet so many of us in the practice (myself included) don’t even notice!
I now have a new story to share with my patients. Thanks for the post!
What a great bog! Thank you for reminding me why I became a dentist.
Thank you Courtney for your break down on the emblem of dentistry. I do not even remember if they told us what it meant in dental school. Great work!
Thank you for sharing!
Thank you for sharing this trivia. I found it fascinating.
Really interesting.. I liked the concept of leaves and berries and it’s co-relation with number of teeth..
nice. But still I didn’t get the actual meaning of middle arrow what represents?
Just stumbled across this…so interesting! I never knew the significance.