They don’t all have that, though.
That’s another question, probably for the top of the list:
Are they all the same thing?
It seems, to my blunt amateur eyes, there might be at least three categories of objects being lumped together:
- Fist-sized hollow bronze forms with deliberately different-sized holes (and knobs on), that have the look of a tool or gadget
- Smaller, chunky objects with holes in them (and knobs on the vertices), that have the look of a mace head
- Container-like hollow objects with only small holes in the faces (but knobs on the corners) that have the look of a censer or salt shaker
The last type in that list, as far as I can tell, only exists in one example - the isocahedron - and I think that one is the easiest to argue that it might not be related to the others in purpose.
‘Some symbolic or ritual or ceremonial or decorative purpose’ is a possible explanation into which all three categories might be lumped (even if the symbolic etc purpose is not necessarily the same for all of the types), but any practical purpose for one type (usually the first on the list above) really requires that type to be divided from the rest. Is it valid to divide them like that? I don’t know. Is it valid to lump them all together? Ditto.
Just for pictorial reference all together:
The ‘might be a tool’ type:
The ‘might be a mace/sceptre head’ type:
The ‘might be a censer’ type:
It is of course possible that these categories are figments of my imagination, because:
I stand corrected.
Leaving aside the isocahedron, are there any other examples where the holes are too small for average sized human fingers?
A jewelers ring sizing tool? For any of the possible uses as a measuring device wouldn’t we find more examples of the same thing made from flat plates of metal, wood, bone, or ceramic?
Agreed. Even for something like a coin sizing gauge, it’s overly elaborate (coin clipping was a problem when coins were made of precious metals)
I thought it might be interesting just to consider features in isolation, with no particular purpose in mind, except for the question ‘can you poke fingers into them?’
Is there any common relationship or ratio between the holes on opposite sides of these things?
Or hasn’t there been a study to that level of detail yet, across enough of them to tell?
If there is a common relationship or ratio between the holes on opposite sides of them, I think that would be strong vote for utilitarian purposes.
Bowling ball?
That would be even worse than one of those weird 2 finger bowling balls.
The idea that they were used as a device for measuring visual angles was based on sizes. However it is yet another idea that doesn’t work for a lots of examples and for some would require holding the device at unrealistically large distances.
Nouwen‘s book linked to above lists the hole diameters as the set of opposite pairs in a systematic manner. So the data is there for anyone who wants to try.
The big problem is that there isn’t any consistency. Whilst it is clear that different size holes were intentional, at least up to a point, a consistent rule has proven hard to find. No two dodecahedra so far found are the same.
Could it be intentional that they’re all different? Some other items are like that, for example signature seals and keys.
Maybe. OTOH the manner in which they are different looks more like a lack of care. One would expect some more clear way of differentiating them, and recognising them. The lack of discriminating symbols on each side is perhaps one of the more puzzling aspects of the different sizes. They are clearly meant to be different sizes, but telling which was which didn’t seem to matter.
An interesting idea shown in one paper is that use of an external measuring tool - a simple cone with marked diameters - that is inserted into each hole and the diameter read off. But this seems unwieldy. And doesn’t really get us much further.
It does suggest to me a game. Played either solitary or competitively. Here the dodecahedron is tossed into the air, and the object is to catch it on the end of a pointed staff. The staff is marked with different diameter rings, and the score depends upon the diameter. Wider diameter is a lower score. Possibly the widest diameters rings (those from the casting process) are wider than the staff, and count for a zero or penalty score. A skilled player would be expected to be able to capture the dodecahedron on the edge of their staff, bounce and flick it about to get access to the highest scoring hole. Rather like a field hockey player handling the ball with their stick. Such a game would be made more evil with the corner knobs, and would require a durable dodecahedron.
I’m not exactly wedded to this as an idea. Just something that occurred to me. What in the range of wear marks and the like we might expect I don’t know. Perhaps the woman buried with one was a particularly adept player.
Something like this…
I can’t get past the idea that the knobs are for wrapping thread or string around. Maybe something like the the Icosian game.
This theory doesn’t even attempt to explain the holes.
I suspect we have a very small sampling of the number that were produced. There could have been thousands or more. There is probably a large number yet unfound and maybe a lot were melted down.
It would make sense that a craftsman/maker of these things would have had a pattern/die/jig to reproduce them in quantity and that method would have produced a lot of similar objects.
The lost wax process lends itself less to the use of patterns. Whilst a maker could have a pattern to cut the individual sides from, that is such a trivial part of the process that it may or may not have been worth the effort. A pattern to cut a single double petal sheet with might be a nice possibility, but folding the sides together may actually be harder than assembling them individually. Just starting with a sheet of wax is likely all that was needed.
These things seem to have been produced over a period of one to two hundred years. So the rate of production may not have been very high. The similarities of production, leading to classification into a few types, does hint that each group may have come from the same maker.
So a maker would likely start by cutting 12 wax pentagons of the same size, and then bind them into a dodecahedron. Then cut large holes in two opposite sides. That is the pattern for the casting. Once cast the pattern is lost, and the maker would typically go on to cut the other 10 holes, any maybe add ornamentation. Those are added by hand engraving or the like. Then he would add the corner knobs by soldering.
It that it it appears the majority of holes were cut after casting that likely leads to more inconsistency. Probably cut with scribing tool set up as a compass. Same tool used for engraving the surrounding pattern on some dodecahedra. The scribe diameter was probably just set by hand for each operation. This handwork is going to be the dominant component of manufacture.
However, adding the ornamentation to the wax pattern would have been my guess, but the descriptions claim that it was added after. (I’ll defer to those that are experts in such artefacts, but given the amount of corrosion on many, I remain somewhat doubtful anyone can make a definitive claim.) I’m going to bet there was a bit of each. Some of the small circle motifs on some dodecahedra look a great deal like gouges in wax, and not gouges in metal. Lost wax has quite high fidelity and would keep the form of such marks.
Some dodecahedra are cast with integral knobs. That would need 20 wax knobs to bind to the main wax pattern. Making these in a little mould would be sensible. Binding the elements together may be as easy as just melding them together with a flame, hot metal tool, or with melted wax. Depends on the wax used. But beeswax is easy.
… or modern chess sets - an example of something well understood, with strict and consistent defined rules for use but expressed in a vast array of different piece shapes and even boards. Differences we focus upon as potentially significant variability may be completely benign and irrelevant as different makers minded their own beeswax.
Unless injury and breakage of the object was all part of the fun, I think it’s unlikely; they just don’t seem like the sort of thing that is intended to be thrown, unless part of the objective of doing that is to break them, or injure someone, or damage something (and those objectives can mostly be met with a rock, or at least don’t require such fancy objects as some of the examples are).
When you describe it like this, it all sounds like an exercise to develop specific skills in bronze casting. I know that’s an explanation that has been slammed down pretty hard already, so I shan’t labour it.
I was more thinking of a simple toss in the air, rather than an energetic throw. A sort of harder version of Bilbo Catcher or kendama. (And no, nothing to do with hobbits, unless Tolkien used it as the source of the character’s name)