An international group of scientists, including Prof. Turi King of Leicester University, has investigated the dental plaque (calculus) of King Richard III and concluded that it was basically the same as both other contemporary remains examined (including those from different social levels), and also modern populations! This is their conclusion:
The dental calculus of King Richard III is exceptionally well-preserved and ancient DNA analysis has revealed an oral microbiome species composition that is highly similar to that of other human dental calculus from northern Europe. Despite excellent DNA preservation and deep sequencing of the DNA libraries, we were unable to identify authentic dietary DNA. We identified a higher level of taxonomic diversity in de novo reconstructed Tannerella genomes than has been reported to date in ancient dental calculus, indicating that further investigation of the diversity of the periodontal disease-associated genus Tannerella is warranted to better understand how the oral microbiome has changed through human history.
If you have the understanding and willpower to read the whole scientific paper, follow the link here.
The copyright holder for the paper (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, made available under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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