Obviously it's a key that needs to be inserted into an ancient titan robot to power it back up.
this post was submitted on 03 Feb 2025
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What an utterly ridiculous notion. Obviously it's a magical battery that, once charged, can be inserted into an ancient titan robot to power it back up.
All we know for certain is that at some point that thing was on some bored Romans knob.
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It's probably some kids workshop assignment that he brought home to his parents.
Except there's heaps of them
Part of a standardized curriculum
Seems pretty convincing and matches gold bracelets made in the era.
I've actually seen an old lady knit gloves with one as well.
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I thought it was a dowel sizing tool for standardized construction.
Why wouldn't you use a simple flat metal bar, or even a ring shaped bar, with standard holes in it?
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Looks like a bigass thundercube to me. Don't wanna fiddle with them too much, they might get krangled.
Actual guess after hearing that they're found with money. Used it to check size of coins for valuation? Sort of like how some coin counters with?
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It’s obviously a dick-measuring tool
Here's my contribution to the 'what the fuck are these things' guesses:
Its a customizable, weighted D12.
You stick the coins into the slots, then do some kind of gambling involving dice rolls.
Part of the game is that as coins are added or removed, the weighting changes.
Hell, it could be that you take turns tossing the thing till its full of coins, thrower has to fill the hollow upward facing hole, as a way of anteing up, then just toss it again untill its empty, thrower takes out the upward facing coin, everyone takes a drink when it lands with a hollow slot face up.
The educated, literate people probably wouldn't bother to write down the exact details of a low class gambling game, when literacy is rare and scrolls/books are expensive.
The things have reportedly often been found in cabinets and drawers alongside coins.
They vary in size... maybe some of the rather large ones could be commissioned as not a practical gambling die, but as an exxageratedly large one, as a trophy or ornament, like modern mall ninja swords or funko pops or something.
Possibly they could also serve a practical purpose for normal people and coin minters to check that their coins are properly sized.
Any... Roman numismatists here that can sanity check this, in terms of coin sizes?
The educated, literate people probably wouldn’t bother to write down the exact details of a low class gambling game, when literacy is rare and scrolls/books are expensive.
Interesting enough, the Roman Emperor Claudius, who was an enthusiastic dicer, wrote a book on gaming/gambling. It's been lost to time, unfortunately.
Literacy is a funny question in regards to the Roman Empire, as is the price of scrolls/books. There's limited evidence that scrolls and books were actually cheaper in the Roman Empire than in the 15th century AD, just before and in-the-early-days-of moveable type, and that urban literacy was fairly widespread. The big problem is that the vast majority of ancient writing simply has not survived the ages.
I'm not well-informed about the dodecahedrons or the theories surrounding them, but I'm inclined to find your explanation, while interesting, probably a bit too complex. Especially considering that coins were often slightly irregular in shape, as the mass-produced neat, perfect circles that we're used to are a result of modern milled coinage
Ah well, worth a shot.