Dentistry has existed for millennia. Wisdom derived from experience has produced principles of practice that influence dentistry. Many of these are oral advisories circulate among dental health care workers in spoken words but are rarely written down. Aim: This article accumulates some of the important orally transferred aphorisms (OTA) and traditions, records them and deconstructs their implications, reasons and significance. Discussion: These oral advising principles have evolved from experience and each act as a dictating guide for policy and activities in the practice of dentistry. Conclusion: Orally transferred aphorisms have been passed down from generation to generation of dentists; those recorded here will be added to, as long as dentistry evolves as a profession to yield further accumulated wisdom of dental health care workers.