The Romans had D20 ?

[vladtolenkov]

Somebody just posted this link Dragon Avenue:

www.christies.com/Lotfinder/lot_details.aspx?intObjectID=4205385

A ROMAN GLASS GAMING DIE

Sale Information

SALE 1314, 11 December 2003 Antiquities

Price Realized
(Set Currency)

* $17,925

* Christie's Buying Guide



A ROMAN GLASS GAMING DIE
Circa 2nd Century A.D.
Deep blue-green in color, the large twenty-sided die incised with a distinct symbol on each of its faces
2 1/16 in. (5.2 cm.) wide
Pre-Lot Text

THE PROPERTY OF A
MARYLAND FINE ARTS PROFESSOR
Provenance

Acquired by the current owner's father in Egypt in the 1920s.
Lot Notes

Several polyhedra in various materials with similar symbols are known from the Roman period. Modern scholarship has not yet established the game for which these dice were used.

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[vladtolenkov]

Several polyhedra in various materials with similar symbols are known from the Roman period. Modern scholarship has not yet established the game for which these dice were used.

Don't we all know the answer to that one?

Okay. . . just kidding but. . .wow.

[korgoth]

The symbols are Greek letters; the Greeks also used their letters to count with. So it's the same as having a numbered die. I'm not sure how high that one goes.

[tavis]

There are two of these at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Greek and Roman exhibit. (You should definitely check them out while you're in New York, zulgyan!) The exhibit text suggests they were used for divinations, where the letter you rolled would be the first letter of your fortune (which I guess you would look up on some kind of chart, probably contained in a 32 page pamphlet...)

I didn't know that about letters = numbers; that's interesting...