Finding a tooth
A tooth found in the house is most often a child's lost baby tooth or a young pet's. Around the world, stories of tooth rats, magpies and mice exist so that a child can hand over a small loss without fear.
What it may mean
A tooth on the floor, under a couch cushion or in the bathroom sink is most often a child's baby tooth that never reached the pillow, or a puppy's or kitten's, since young pets shed theirs too. Old tooth customs each have a plan for it, and none of them leaves it lying around. In Venezuela a tooth rat carries it off to an underground kingdom. Korean children threw theirs onto the roof for a magpie, and in Belgium teeth went into a mouse hole so the new one would come in as white as a mouse's. All of these stories do the same job. They give a nervous child somewhere to put a small loss and a reason to expect a stronger tooth to follow. Adults tell themselves stories like that as well, about a move, a lost job or a birthday with a zero in it, and some of them help more than others.
Depending on how you saw it
A pet's tooth in the rug
Puppies and kittens shed their needle-sharp baby teeth at a few months old, and most are swallowed or lost without anyone seeing. Finding one in the carpet is often the first sign the change has happened. Who in your home has been growing while you were busy?
A fossil tooth on the beach
Black, glossy shark teeth on some beaches are fossils, darkened over time by minerals in the sediment. In Britain, fossil fish teeth called toadstones were once set in gold and worn as rings. What have you picked up that turned out to be far older than you guessed?
Throwing it over your shoulder
A Turkish custom in the old encyclopedia had a child who shed a milk tooth throw it over the right shoulder to the words "Go away, little donkey; come, big donkey," and walk on without looking back. Not looking back is the hard part. What have you let go of lately that you keep turning around to check on?
A tooth kept in a jewelry box
Many parents keep their children's baby teeth in a box or an envelope and find them years later while cleaning out a drawer. The find can be a jolt. Which small keepsake from someone's childhood would you never throw away, and why that one?
Why it happens in nature
Children lose 20 baby teeth, roughly between the ages of six and twelve, and a loose one can come out while eating, playing or sleeping. Puppies and kittens shed their baby teeth at a few months old, often unnoticed. Teeth are the hardest parts of the body, so they survive for years indoors and far longer in sand or soil, which is why fossil teeth turn up on beaches.
What folk beliefs say
Venezuela
In Venezuela, instead of a tooth fairy, children have a tooth rat that comes for a lost tooth and takes it to its underground kingdom.
Source: ivyhong (collector), Tooth Rat (USC Digital Folklore Archive) (2016), folklore.usc.edu. View the page
Korea
Korean children who shed a baby tooth used to toss it onto the roof, hoping a magpie would take it and return with a new, permanent tooth.
Source: eungihon (collector), Magpies and Baby Teeth (USC Digital Folklore Archive) (2016), folklore.usc.edu. View the page
Belgium
In Belgium, some people put children's teeth in a mouse hole, so that the next tooth would come in as white as a mouse's.
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 1 (1903), vol. 1, p. 337. View the page
Madagascar
In Madagascar, a child who loses a tooth throws it onto the top of the house, saying, "I exchange the bad for the good."
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 1 (1903), vol. 1, p. 337. View the page
Turkey
In Turkey, when a child sheds a milk tooth, someone says "Go away, little donkey; come, big donkey," and the child throws the tooth over the right shoulder and walks on without looking back.
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 1 (1903), vol. 1, p. 42. View the page
Britain
Brand quotes Pennant on the fossil grinding teeth of the wolf-fish, called toadstones, which were once much prized for imaginary virtues and set in gold to be worn as rings.
Source: John Brand; Henry Ellis (ed.), Observations on the Popular Antiquities of Great Britain, vol. 3 (1849), vol. 3, p. 50. View the page
To reflect on
Which story helps you through a change you cannot avoid?