Some people call them vampire teeth, some people call them fangs, while others call them canine teeth… but essentially, they’re the same thing!
What are vampire teeth?
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According to Shining Smiles, vampire teeth are just canine teeth that are extra pointy and sharp. The shape is genetically predetermined.
If you have vampire teeth and don’t want them, an experienced dentist can fix them. So, make sure that you choose an experienced dentist to do this!
How do people get vampire teeth?
Human men today have 10% larger vampire teeth than women and this difference isn’t unique to our species. Our close relatives, the gorillas, have it as well to an even larger extent. Males’ canines are twice as long as the females’.
…that is because in gorilla society, males compete for exclusive mating rights to the entire female troop, and the male with the longest, most intimidating set of fangs usually wins.
However, our vampire teeth have actually become shorter over time. In fact, they are the shortest they’ve ever been, and the difference between male and female vampire teeth got less pronounced as well.
That’s because, unlike modern gorillas, human men eventually stopped fighting with their teeth somewhere along the way. Now, scientists aren’t entirely sure why this happened…
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Those vampire teeth you carry around today aren’t particularly useful. For one thing, they’re not long enough to grab and hold on to prey the way lions use them, and they’re not big enough to intimidate predators’ arrivals as hippos do as well.
Instead, they help us bite into food and that’s it!
Turns out, evolution isn’t always useful but while the truth about our vampire teeths might be disappointing, those teeth are still pretty amazing because anthropologists use vampire teeth size and shape to help track when humanlike ancestors evolved.
So in a way, our tiny vampire teeth make us who we are today!
By: Aishah Akashah Ahadiat
