They find a dodecahedron buried in a field and the mystery born in 1739 grows

From time to time, in a forgotten desert, in an antique dealer’s trunk or on a site excavated in the domains of ancient Romethe mystery resurfaces dodecahedron Romans, some strange ancient objects in bronze whose function is unknown.

The Roman dodecahedron is a geometric figure with twelve pentagonal faces pierced by non-identical circles and surmounted at the vertices by small protruding spheres. They date back to the 2nd and 3rd century AD C, They are hollow and about the size of a tennis ball.although copies vary in workmanship and size.

The first was found in 1739 in Aston, England, and since then some 120 have been discovered in Europe, plus those that may be in private collections or still buried, but it is not yet known exactly what their true meaning was.

The last one appeared in the Belgian city of Kortessem. An amateur archaeologist named Patrick Schuermann, who was scanning an agricultural field with a metal detector, came across a 6cm fragment of metal which turned out to be a dodecahedron and turned it over to the Flemish Heritage Agency.

“Many hypotheses have been formulated about the function of these strange objectsbut there is no conclusive explanation”, summarizes that institution on some pieces that are not mentioned in the historical texts.

Dodecahedra: mystery, witchcraft and clairvoyance

The list of possible uses attributed to them is wide and varied: weapon, tool for planning sowing, candlestick, appliance for knitting gloves, a toy, an amuleta die, a weight for fishing nets, a musical instrument, a banner, a device for calculating distances on the battlefield, a joint, a tool for calibrating pipes…

But Belgian archaeologists who have studied the 1,600-year-old object suspect they were used magical rituals related to witchcraft or divination.

“It is entirely possible (…). For now we do not have a satisfactory proposal for a practical use, although there are many hypotheses. A use as a magical object or a sort of ‘defixio’ (cursed tablet) is still possible” , he explains to EFE Guido CreamerCurator of the Gallo-Roman Museum of Tongeren.

The lack of written references would respond to the fact that clairvoyance and witchcraft were very popular among the Celts and Romans but “were not officially allowed and there were severe punishments”.

“We know of a category of metal plates with magical inscriptions (…) which were placed, for example, in houses in a place where they were not visible. They were created by wizards and his fate was to curse the landlord. It could be that the dodecahedrons served a similar purpose, for example predicting the future.”

Another clue is the discovery in Geneva in 1982 during the restoration works of the Cathedral of San Pietro of a full, not hollow, dodecahedron. with the signs of the zodiac engraved in Latinpoint.

“If I’m forced to give an explanation, I should look for it in this direction,” adds the archaeologist.

The new Belgian dodecahedron also reinforces the widespread theory that they were related to Celtic cultures and not to the practices of the Italian peninsula, so they would not be Gallo-Roman.

They appeared in Italy or Hungary, but above all in France, Belgium, Holland, Germany and Great Britain. That is, in what were Gaul, Germany and Britain, Celtic territories invaded by Julius Caesar between 58 and 51 BC C., and largely administered by Rome until the fifth century.

“It is remarkable that the dodecahedrons are not present in the area at all around the Mediterranean Sea like Hispania or North Africa, but in “an area coinciding with that of Celtic civilization,” says the Flemish Heritage Agency.

The city that the Romans called Atuatuca Tungrorum (Tongeren in Flemish or Tongres in French) was the place where Germano-Celtic tribe of the Eburonescommanded by Catuvolco and Ambiorix and defeated by the Roman troops of Julius Caesar.

In the 19th century, in the heat of the romantic-nationalist currents, Ambiorix became one of the national heroes of a nascent Belgian state in need of national symbols and today he has enshrined squares, statues and streets across the country.

The geographical location of the dodecahedrons is also consistent with the fact that they were made using the complicated sculptural technique of wax casting and the Celts were great metallurgical masters.

the new fragment will be on display from March in the Gallo-Roman Museum of Tongeren, which owns a complete specimen found in 1939. A third found in Belgium, in 1888 in the municipality of Bassenge, is exhibited in the Grand Curtius museum in Liège. EFE extension