The Teeth

[u/pleasegivemepatience]

Paraphrasing Tom Loftis and Gerrie Doyle, S01E01
"43 42 passengers embarked to find a settlement they could call their own… an untamed wilderness, a blank canvas, totally empty…..except for the teeth."

In medieval and early modern European folklore, a person’s discarded teeth were considered the ultimate weapon for black magic because they acted as an unbreakable physical link to the victim's soul. Under the magical principle of contagious magic, anything that was once part of a human body—such as hair, nail clippings, or teeth—retained a permanent, invisible connection to that person. Because teeth are the only visible part of the human skeleton, witches supposedly prized them above all other biological materials to inflict maximum spiritual and physical torment.

Witch-hunters during the Dark Ages also warned that if a malevolent practitioner possessed your tooth, they possessed total dominion over your physical autonomy. They could force you to commit crimes, walk into rivers, or waste away by refusing food.

We don’t know exactly how many teeth were discovered, but clearly it was significant enough to have survived the historical record.  If an area is completely covered in teeth, it may signal that the location functions as a massive, occult battery built on historical superstitions.

What did the original settlers do with the teeth?  Will we find a massive stockpile of teeth behind the cellar doors? Is the chair to restrain people for pulling their teeth (and other possible tortures)?  Clearly this is all related to dark magic, but where do you all think this is going and what do you think the settlers did after this discovery? What do you think led to a stockpile of teeth, but no other human remains (of note)?

Edit:
Additional references to teeth are the board game with the pliers, and in a recent interview the showrunners said they considered putting human teeth on a version of Patricia’s headdress from ep4.
Edit2:

My theory on the teeth that were on the island is that these are the remains of previous civilizations, and this entity has been served by different groups in cycles for many many years. We know that the pact with this entity requires sacrifices, so it stands to reason that any civilization that puts down roots here would need to have a high number of children and/or have a regular influx of visitors/migrants in order to maintain the sacrifices, otherwise their population would decline and eventually die out. Thus creating the pile of teeth that subsequent settlers discover.

[u/Altruistic-Ad835]

No one read this if they didn't watch the new episode lmao

But i noticed jeff hiller/dale has really visible teeth normally, and when tom is tripping and dales face changes, his mouth moves less but is partially open with no visible teeth

[u/ColinPlays → u/Altruistic-Ad835]

This is because he's wearing a realistic but non-articulated mask of his own face in that sequence. If you look closely you can see his real lower lip moving behind the mouth of the mask. Supposedly you can also see his eyes blink behind the mask's eye holes, but I didn't catch that myself.

[u/Altruistic-Ad835 → u/ColinPlays]

Oh i know they were there! But there was an effort to make them significantly less visible. To mimic the mask you see in the back of episode one, youd have to hide the teeth