Discussing a Forensic Dental Examination of 1861--A Scientific and Historic Overview

Abstract

This work is a discussion on a report of dental examination and exclusion made by a British dentist Francis Robertus Lloyd on 30th April 1861. The report entitled: 'Dentistry as a means of Identification' was published in the 'British Journal of Dental Science' under the section 'Miscellanea' in 1861; Mr. Lloyd was contacted by the Indian authorities in order to identify a skull. He may well be the first British dentist to officially report a dental examination in an academic journal. The aims of this discussion are to briefly analyze the difficulties of access to scientific techniques in that century and to provide Mr. Lloyd recognition of his report in the history of Forensic Dentistry.