Histoire : Les Dés à 20 Faces de l'Antiquité

Voici le dé romain, 2e siècle après Jésus-Christ :

Romans Used 20-Sided Dice Two Millennia Before D&D
By [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] 06.15.08 4:00 AM

Many of us geeks take great pride in the ability to recite the history of role-playing games based on the 20-sided die,
but what about the history of the die itself? Apparently it predates the original Dungeons and Dragons by almost two millenia.
Christie’s, auctioneer to the rich and famous, sold a [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] from Roman times. It was included in a collection of other
antiquities that sold in 2003. The markings on the die don’t appear to be either Arabic or Roman numerals, but it’s probably
a safe bet that it was used in a game of chance. As the auction catalog notes that several polyhedral dice are known from
the Roman era, but remarks, " Modern scholarship has not yet established the game for which these dice were used."
I wonder – how do you say "critical hit" in Latin?  (Ed. note: "maxima plaga")
The seller acquired this die from his father, who picked it up in the 1920s in Egypt. Sounds like the beginning of an Indiana
Jones movie, doesn’t it?
(Thanks to Marty for the pointer. Photo from [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] web site.)
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et voici le dé égyptien, entre 30 et 300 ans avant Jésus-Christ :

Ancient d20 die emerges from the ashes of time
Many centuries before Dungeons & Dragons was even a glimmer in the eye of Gary Gygax, ancient Egyptians were rolling a d20 die.
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November 9, 2012 10:00 AM PST

(Credit: Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Let's go back in time. Way back. Keep going. OK, stop. You're in the Ptolemaic Period. It's somewhere around 304 to 30 B.C.
You're in Egypt. You're playing Dungeons & Dragons. Except back then, it's more like Pyramids & Petsuchos.
The [Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir ce lien] owns what may be the world's oldest d20 die. It's made out of serpentine and looks to be in
remarkably good shape for its age.
The die is a little over an inch tall. The symbols carved into the die appear to be of Greek origin, in keeping with it coming from
the Ptolemaic Period.
The symbols for eta, theta, and epsilon can be clearly seen. Maybe it was used to determine which frat the ancients were going
to pledge, but I'd like to think it was used to roll for hit points for warrior and sphinx classes. Now all we need is for someone to
3D-model this so we can print it out and make up our own ancient Egyptian version of D&D.
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