Imagine holding a beautifully carved crystal object that was tossed by ancient hands over two millennia ago to seek chance or wisdom....
This remarkable 20‑sided crystal die known from the Roman and Hellenistic world. This small icosahedron, now preserved in major museum collections, offers a rare glimpse into how ancient people combined mathematics, belief, and play in objects we once thought were only part of modern gaming culture.
Archaeologists have uncovered several polyhedral dice from the ancient Mediterranean, especially from Egyptian and Roman contexts, dating as far back as the Ptolemaic and Roman periods between 2nd Century BC and 4th Century AD. Among the most fascinating are 20‑sided dice (icosahedra) carved from stone, serpentinite, faience, or even rock crystal. At the Musée du Louvre and Metropolitan Museum of Art, such dice show faces inscribed with letters or numerals — clues that they were not just decorative but carried a purpose in everyday life or ritual.