The long tubular shell, in shape like a tooth or tusk, of any gastropod mollusk of Dentalium or other allied genus; also the mollusk itself. b. False tooth-shell, the similar shell (or animal) of the molluskous genus Cœca, or the family Cæcidæ. c. ‘In Australia, the shell of Marinula pellucida, a small marine mollusc used for necklaces’ (Morris, Austral Eng.).
c. 1711. Petiver, Gazophyl., vii. 65. Small English Tooth-shell… It’s smooth, white, and somewhat crooked with purplish Tips.
1777. Pennant, Zool., IV. 127. Dentalium, tooth-shell.
1850. Miss Pratt, Comm. Things Sea-side, v. 314. The old shell of the mollusk, commonly called Tooth-shell (Dentalium entalis),… so common on our coasts, shaped like a small horn.
1879. E. P. Wright, Anim. Life, 548. The Tooth-shells are animal feeders, devouring foraminifera and minute bivalves.
