One cure mentioned in the ancient Hebrew Talmud is a mouthwash composed of dough water, olive oil and salt.

Another Talmudic cure for bad breath is holding a pepper between the teeth. Unfortunately, no one is around to tell us exactly what they referred to as a pepper two thousand years ago.

About 800 years ago, the Jewish sage Rashi, suggested that a long pepper was the kind required. Intrepid readers may want to compare several kinds and let me know…

Finally, the ancient Jewish folklore recommends chewing “Mastic”. In this case, the reference is to the resin of Pistacia lentiscus, a bush related botanically to the famous pistachio. This resin has been chewed around the Mediterranean for thousands of years, and is probably quite effective in reduction of oral malodor (chewing anything stimulates saliva and improves bad breath). Mastic is also used for other medicinal and semi-medicinal purposes, including its incorporation in home-brewed arak. Mastic can still be obtained from several sources, and is sold as breath-freshening chewing gum in Greece, even though it is not cheap. Gum mastic is big business on the Greek island of Chios, just off the Turkish coast, which has a practical monopoly on its production. Incisions are made in the trunk of the tree and the exuding resin hardens and is harvested. The quality of the mastic depends on whether it is collected straight from the bark, from the ground (actually from gravel laid around the trunk), etc.

There's another indication of the significance of fresh breath in Judaism: whereas chewing gum mastic is usually not allowed during the Sabbath, chewing it for relief of bad breath is permitted. Gum mastic (ladanum) was possibly mentioned in the book of Genesis (chapter 37) as one of the products carried by the caravan that took Joseph down to Egypt.