An apparently new type of dental wear pattern, lingual surface attrition of the maxillary anterior teeth (LSAMAT), has been found in 85% of 46 adult crania from a 3000-4200 BP Archaic site called Corondó near the Atlantic Ocean coast of Brazil. LSAMAT is associated with a high caries rate (60% of 77 adults; 11% of 1,219 permanent teeth) in what on archaeological grounds alone would be considered a mainly meat-eating population. It is suggested that both LSAMAT and caries resulted from eating some starchy plant like manioc.