What a wonderful rabbit hole to go down. My takeaways are it could possibly be used for knitting, but traditional spool knitting that the Grandma uses in the video doesn't show up in history until the 1500s. If the Romans did use it for gloves then knitting has been around much longer than we have evidence of or they were using a different method with the dodecahedron.
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Except that's probably not what they're for, I saw a video recently (I think it was this one) that went into detail about the reasons why it doesn't make much sense for these to be a knitting tool.
There's a lesson here about the differences between history and a good historical narrative, but that's the lesson of most history and no one ever listens to it.
There’s a lesson here about the differences between history and a good historical narrative, but that’s the lesson of most history and no one ever listens to it.
There’s a lesson here about the differences between history and a good historical narrative, but that’s the lesson of most history and no one ever listens to it.
First and foremost: knitting wasn’t invented until centuries later and didn’t appear in Europe until about the 14th century.
I hope this is the next episode of hardcore history. I could use 30 hours of Dan Carlin context on knitting...
Decoding the Unknown (also by Simon Whistler) did a video on these as well
maybe its for measuring how much pasta you need to boil
There's no horse on it, silly!
I understood that reference
That's a d12. Clearly, the Romans were using it to play D&D.
Last time one of these threads popped up, I saw someone suggest that it might have been a holder for some of those bottles with pointed bottoms the Romans had, don't remember the name. I'm not sure if this is a hypothesis with any level of acceptance, but it feels like it could be plausible just from looking at the thing, having different sized holes would allow different sizes of bottle to fit, and you'd want feet for each possible side that it could be resting on, which would explain the prongs.
These devices are rather small and most amphora seem to be much larger. The shape of amphora helped with shipping, so they were typucally larger than a device that can fit in your hand.
I'm not sure if this is a hypothesis with any level of acceptance
Unless an actual record is found describing what they were used for, it's all just guesses anyway.
those bottles with pointed bottoms the Romans had, don’t remember the name.
Future archeologist: What do you think they used those things for?

My point is, maybe it was just art, fun, deko?
My mother got really interested in these things a while ago. I think she mostly buys into the glove-knitting theory. Whatever the case, I 3D printed her a model of one and it's sitting on the mantle over her fireplace.
Archaeologists in 2000 years will be puzzled again. "Plastic dodecahedra found near broken mantelpieces, what could it be used for? Anyway I made one out of technetium for my grandma"
"It was probably either religious in nature, or used for deciding when to put seeds in the ground"
I 3D printed her a model of one and it's sitting on the mantle over her fireplace.
That kinda hints to it not being very useful then...
It's a girth measurer.
Grandma's are the best
You put fossils in them dude
Possible Ritual Use™ 😸
Love these, though I'll never remember the name or how to write it ...
I just assumed it was one of these http://www.voting.ukscientists.com/penrose.html


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