<P> Impacted wisdom teeth are classified by the direction and depth of impaction, the amount of available space for tooth eruption and the amount soft tissue or bone that covers them . The classification structure allows clinicians to estimate the probabilities of impaction, infections and complications associated with wisdom teeth removal . Wisdom teeth are also classified by the presence of symptoms and disease . </P> <P> Treatment of an erupted wisdom tooth is the same as any other tooth in the mouth . If impacted, treatment can be localized to the infected tissue overlying the impaction, extraction or coronectomy . </P> <P> Although formally known as third molars, the common name is wisdom teeth because they appear so late--much later than the other teeth, at an age where people are presumably "wiser" than as a child, when the other teeth erupt . The term probably came as a translation of the Latin dens sapientiae . Their eruption has been known to cause dental issues for millennia; it was noted at least as far back as Aristotle: </P> <P> The last teeth to come in man are molars called' wisdom - teeth', which come at the age of twenty years, in the case of both sexes . Cases have been known in women upwards of eighty years old where at the very close of life the wisdom - teeth have come up, causing great pain in their coming; and cases have been known of the like phenomenon in men too . This happens, when it does happen, in the case of people where the wisdom - teeth have not come up in early years . </P>

Where does the term long in the tooth come from