20 sided die and ancient aliens?

Hey ATS, I just read about the ancient Egyptian D20 which I know someone else has posted a thread about recently ( Link here for a story about it ) but what was missing from the discussion was how was this dice created? It is remarkably hard even today to carve an icosahedron out of anything much less stone. I'm not saying that this is a magic alien dice or anything like that, but it is very strange. Does anyone know how ancient people could have accomplished such a thing? Or could this maybe be an example of ancient peoples getting a little outside help. Thoughts?

reply to post by InvaderSkich


translation : you dont understand it , therefore ..........< insert aliens / god etc etc >

reply to post by InvaderSkich


Dude, there's about a million discovery channel documentary's and such that show how ancient civilizations had made stone structures and objects with mathematical precision... This may be the first time I've ever said this but..... You need to turn on the TV... Heh

reply to post by InvaderSkich

Those die are amazing but still a small feat for our ancient forefathers.
The symmetry on the Ramses statues at Luxor are mind blowing. There is at least one statue carved with such precision that the left side of the face is an exact mirrored image of the right. We can only do that today with machines and nothing less.



Did aliens help? Possibly but I'm leaning toward the theory that our race was once technologically advanced in the past and then something cataclysmic happened changing that.

Why do you think it would be difficult to make??

It's actually a very easy structure to complete.

The triangular pyramid (tetrahedron) is the easiest , then the octahedron, and the icosahedron is next, all due to having equilateral triangles as the faces. Whoever told you it was difficult wasn't telling you the truth.

Besides, look at the very large solid formations they produced and the accuracy that was involved. Making an icosahedron would be very simple for them, just as it is for us today (otherwise they wouldn't be so plentiful).

It's one of the five basic Platonic solids that were very common in ancient Greece, hence the name "Platonic Solid"

reply to post by InvaderSkich

Well gee, I liked hearing about it. Thanks for bringing it. I had not seen it before. It surely is an item that was cast on a flat surface. Scrabble?

I notice it isn't shown sitting so that one side always faces up? Maybe the character facing down was the lucky number. Maybe they drew lots with it? Maybe they conned people out of money like guess where the Queen is or three cups... confidence or shell games?

Would like to hold said item for a minute. The tales it could tell.

reply to post by InvaderSkich


So what your saying
is Ancient Egyptians
like playing Dungeons & Dragons

Aliens. They zoom a bagillion space miles to come here and with their inexplicable intelligence, bestow upon us the one thing that has given them that inner desire to be more. a dice.

Do you think this dice was the cause of our decline? From it we developed the desire for greed? They planted the seed of desire in our minds and we festered away into what we are now?

The possibilities are endless. Do we roll a 9, or a 19. I mean, what if!!!!

wow, ok let me apply my burn cream here for that merciless flaming. I said in my OP I wasn't trying to claim aliens invented the D20 so back off a bit guys, yeesh. Thanks for the bit of non-hating feedback.

reply to post by TheLieWeLive


The ancients were amazing in the precision they had in the things they created.

When I was a kid,I had a stone that was soft and rubbed it on a harder surface till I created a shape with many flat sides,far from perfect.
Now,take a person who has become a master craftsman doing the same thing.

This was not knowledge from the stars,IMHO,but from years of trial and error.
Never sell the intelligence of us human's short.