In recent years, and as discussed in the introduction to this volume, theoretically informed approaches to Roman material culture have become mainly concerned with the themes of identity, representation and consumption (e.g. Eckardt 2005; Greene 2008), while synthetic studies of the Roman period show a limited engagement with artefact studies (e.g. Millett 1990; Woolf 1998; Mattingly 2006). Functional studies of individual artefacts and their assemblages make a valuable contribution to Roman social history, yet one that has been persistently neglected. In part this is because of the focus of synthetic studies on political and economic questions and the ‘Romanisation’ debate. It also stems from the misperception that studies of functional artefacts have little to contribute to investigations of cultural change. This chapter outlines a theoretically informed approach to functional studies, particularly in relation to the design function of artefacts. Drawing specifically on design theory, and using Roman dice and Roman finger-rings as short case studies, I investigate the relationships between the physical features of artefacts (their form and material), everyday social practice and experience, and wider cultural traditions of behaviour.
Artefact studies are particularly suited to an exploration of the diversity of changing social experience in the Roman world. This has been well-demonstrated in a number of analyses of pottery forms, which explore for instance cultural or regional diversity in foodways, or chronological changes in dining habits. In such studies, pottery forms have been used mainly to document variation in social behaviour, rather than exploring how the objects actively enable or foster such behaviours and their maintenance or attrition (e.g. Cool 2006, 39–41; Hawthorne 2000). As regards ‘small finds’ studies, while there have been previous considerations of regional and chronological diversity, generally the aim has been to investigate aspects of identity and representation (e.g. Eckardt 2014; Jundi and Hill 1998). These approaches have yielded important results, for instance with regard to the construction of identities through material culture, but there is much potential for more in-depth exploration of discrepant social practices and experience. This could be done, for instance, by exploring how cultural traditions and beliefs were embedded within and contested by wider society through material culture, and investigating the key role of artefacts in enacting cultural change and development.
Design theory uses a particular term, affordance, to describe the perceived properties of an artefact that make possible, and incline people towards, a range of uses (Norman 2002[1988]; see also Knappett 2004). Often these are uses intended by the maker (for instance sitting on the seat of a chair). Some objects also have affordances that make them suitable for divergent uses that are different to those envisaged by the maker (for example keeping a door open by using a chair as a prop). Affordances can be considered to be relational, in that they emerge within particular contexts of use, and can thus vary with different usage.
Many studies of artefacts intuitively make use of the concept of affordances in order to reconstruct possible functions. This concept can help us to refocus on the materiality of objects, that is, the physical properties and qualities of both form and material, by examining how their practical features intersect with various possible actions and behaviours. An informed viewpoint is necessary, in which critiques of the associated concept that ‘form relates to function’ are taken into account (Hodder 1995, 86–9; Miller 1985, 51–74; Swift 2017).
A useful exploration of artefact function is that made by Beth Preston. She suggests a dialectical relationship between what she terms ‘proper function’ and ‘system function’. Proper function refers to the use for which an artefact was made, and ‘system function’ to the way that an artefact is actually used. These may coincide, for instance a woodcutter’s axe used to cut down a tree, or they may be different, for instance a woodcutter’s axe used as a weapon. As she explains, archaeologists in recent years have tended to focus on the ‘system function’ definition, using contextual archaeology to examine, particularly, the end-use phase of an artefact’s life. The end-use phase is often constituted by a secondary or discrepant function as compared to the original purpose for which the artefact was made (its proper function). However, it is useful to consider both proper and system functions and the way that they are interrelated in much more depth. New uses for objects may develop, influenced by wider social trends, and these may then influence adaptations in the design of future examples (Preston 2000; 2013, 152–60; Swift 2017). Objects, or features of objects, may also move between practical and representational uses (Swift 2014, 231) or simultaneously fulfil both types of uses. A practical use for an object can form either a proper or a system function for that object, and the same is true of representational uses. This complexity in the ongoing development and use of artefacts is something that has been rarely considered in Roman small finds studies. Yet it is essential to take it into account if we are to successfully address the relationships that exist between artefacts and various aspects of human culture and behaviour in the Roman period.
As a brief example to illustrate the relationship between proper and system function, and the utility of analysing the detail of material properties such as object affordances, I consider Roman finger-rings with engraved motifs. It has been suggested that in the later Roman period the use of such rings to stamp seals was a declining practice, and instead engraved images on rings were used purely decoratively. The argument is made on the basis of the affordances of the stones within seal-rings in the earlier and later Roman periods, although the term is not used explicitly. Stones set into early Roman rings are more transparent and more convex, meaning that the engraved design is difficult to see until it is stamped into wax, while later stones are less transparent and flatter, so that the motif shows up more clearly on the ring itself, and thus they would increasingly be suited to decorative uses. The trend has been suggested to relate to declining levels of literacy in the late Roman period, although any necessary association between seal rings and writing practices has since been questioned by new research that shows that seals were also used in other ways (Zienkiewicz 1986, 121; Johns 1996, 78; Cool 2010, 305; Andrews 2013). Notwithstanding this proviso, the possible trajectory from a practical tool to a representational object, which in this case shows the dialectic between proper and system function uses and the development of a new proper function, can be evaluated further by examining additional details of object appearance and affordance.
As an example, I examine one particular type of engraved motif on finger-rings, the Chi-rho motif, that usually occurs engraved on a metal bezel rather than on a stone set into a ring. This late Roman motif, as the name suggests, is composed of Greek letters. When it is depicted on a ring used as a seal-ring, it thus needs to be represented backwards so that the motif appears correctly, and is readable, when stamped into wax (Fig. 11.1). Conversely, if the intention is to use the motif purely as a decorative feature of the ring, it should be depicted frontwards, and the ring will have a mainly representational function. In both cases the ring may be used to display Christian allegiance, or involvement with the late Roman state by the user (Petts 2003, 103–14), but in the first case, the object has a specific practical function in creating a separate stamp that will act representationally. The backwards facing motif shows only slight divergence from the ‘correct’ motif, and this may mean that it simultaneously held a representational and practical function in some instances.
Examining the orientation of the motif allows us to evaluate the suggestion that rings with engraved motifs lost their function as seal-rings by the late Roman period. Data on extant rings (mostly without provenance) show that the motif occurs depicted both frontwards (14 examples) and backwards (13 examples). These trends exist irrespective of materials, with both frontward and backward-facing motifs occurring on both gold and copper alloy rings.1 In representations of Chi-rho motifs in other contexts such as mosaic floors, on silver spoons and plate, on belt fittings, on coinage, etc. they are invariably shown correctly. If, despite facing the wrong way, the motif had become purely representational on rings, or if it were simply a case of mistakes being made, one would expect more instances of backwards facing motifs in these other media. Instead, backwards facing motifs correlate strongly with contexts in which they could function as seal stamps. In conclusion, examining the evidence of potential affordances shows that there is indeed a change towards representational uses for this type of finger-ring, but there is also evidence that a function for an engraved ring to create a seal stamp persisted in the late Roman period.
Figure 11.1 Bezel from finger-ring with representation of Chi-rho motif (shown backwards), Portable Antiquities Scheme LEIC-5FC533 (Worrell 2008, cat. no. 10). © Leicestershire County Council, licensed under a Creative Commons Licence.
In addition to demonstrating the relationship between proper and system function, the example is illuminating in a number of ways. Firstly, it shows how affordances are already used intuitively in archaeological interpretation. Clearly, a more explicit approach is desirable. Secondly, it illustrates the way that practical and representational functions for artefacts may fluctuate within one category of material. Thirdly, it shows that the study of affordances provides evidence that contributes to established debates, for instance that concerning cultural change in the late Roman period. More generally, the evidence of artefacts like these allows us to examine daily practice across a wider spectrum of society than might otherwise be possible. There are of course potential problems. This example also shows that affordances must be used with caution, as the change in potential affordances visible in stone-set rings is only partially borne out by evidence of those in which both bezel and hoop are made of metal. We can also see that it is difficult to avoid over-simplification when attempting to incorporate artefact evidence into explanatory narratives.
For a more detailed example I examine Roman dice in relation to the affordances of the object and how they relate to the social experience of gaming, gambling and divination in the Roman world. Data have been collected as part of a wider project on the design and function of everyday Roman artefacts, mainly through museum visits that have provided an opportunity to examine and record details relating to how the dice were used in everyday activities. The data are evenly split between Roman Britain and Roman Egypt (ca. 100 from each area), with a scatter of material from other places. The dice, including those in luxury materials, show much evidence of normative use, for instance, chipping to corners and wear to surfaces, so we can be confident that for much of their lives they were used for the purposes for which they were made. In terms of assessing the material qualities of the object I was fortunate enough to be allowed to roll many of the dice and so evaluate how the qualities of dice may have affected play at first-hand (see Swift 2017 for a full presentation of some of the material discussed below).
Figure 11.2 Examples of amber and crystal dice, British Museum acc. nos. 1772,0311.224 (amber) and 1772,0311.220 (rock crystal). © The Trustees of the British Museum.
Dice were used in gambling games, board games similar to backgammon, and in divination practices (for these see Graf 2005; Klingshorn 2002; 2005). Ancient sources tell us something about these games and their social and cultural context, and archaeological evidence of course exists in the form of game boards, counters and dice shakers, as well as the dice themselves (on gaming and equipment, see Toner 1995; Carbone 2005; Purcell 1995; Schädler 1995; May 1991).
At one level, dice as material agents enacted the will of the goddess Fortuna in the human world. They also express the concept of randomness or probability and there is some evidence from ancient texts that the Roman elite understood how these concepts related to dice games: Cicero for instance shows an awareness of probability with regard to successive dice throws (David 1962, 24; Cicero On Divination, 1, 23 [transl. Wardle 2006, 53–4]). Dice are particularly interesting objects from a material perspective, because the material qualities of the object directly affect the experience of play and are used to enact and contest particular social rules. For instance, a small number of Roman dice are weighted with lead to always land on a six. For two examples, from Arles and Nîmes, see Artefacts online encyclopedia type DEJ-401, http:/artefacts/mom.fr. Another unfinished example comes from Rome (St. Clair 2003, 114 cat. no. 597), dated to the first to second centuries AD. In this way, weighted dice contest the convention of fairness of outcome seen in the design of cubic dice.
Although this is of course a broad-brush approach, I examine what the objects ‘do’ in the social context, and trace consequent possible diversity in social experience, by comparing dice made from luxury materials to those in more everyday materials. Elite gamers may sometimes have participated in games alongside lower status people, for instance in taverns, and thus also have used dice made in more ordinary materials. Based on literary evidence, however, Toner suggests that gambling and gaming normally occurred in peer-groups (1995, 95). Such a comparison has not previously been made, since extant studies of dice focus only on bone, the most common material.
The luxury materials under study are amber and rock crystal (often inlaid with gold leaf). Fig. 11.2 shows examples of each. Although many are without provenance, dice in these materials retrieved in excavation contexts support the Roman date that has been assigned to them in museum collections (e.g. rock crystal die inlaid with gold leaf, Koster 2013, burial 4 at Nijmegen, dating to the late first to early second century AD; amber die from Roman London, context dated to the second half of the fourth century AD, Glyn Davis pers. comm.).
Dice also occur in ivory, but since this material can be difficult to visually distinguish from bone it would not be a very effective marker of luxury and as such it is not considered here. Luxury dice are likely to have been used in private games among the urban elite. The only example with details of a burial context suggests it was owned by a wealthy member of the provincial elite (Koster 2013, 186–7, Burial 4). Examples in the British Museum collected by Sir William Hamilton, Ambassador to the Kingdom of Naples, are likely to have been acquired in Italy.2
How far the dice conform to the ideal of a perfect cube (and thus an equal likelihood of all outcomes) can be examined by classing as ‘regular’ all those dice where the lengths of each face measured within 5% of each other. The number of rock crystal and amber dice for which accurate measurements are available is quite small (8 examples). All except one were regular cubes using the 5% measure. Some further examples of Roman amber dice shown in photographs (accurate measurements not available) appear to show similar trends (Calvi 2005, 134–5 and Tav. 94–6). All the rock crystal and amber dice studied show high production standards, for instance in the regularity with which the spots are arranged, and the uniformity of the treatment of edges and surfaces. Standardisation in design would have been used as a reference point for quality, implying that the object was trustworthy, and the qualities of the dice attempt to foster a uniformity of gaming experience. Of course, different users would still be affected by the material qualities of the objects in different ways, for instance transparency or translucency would make the dice more problematic for some user groups, such as short-sighted people, since the numbers are quite difficult to make out even where filled in with an opaque material. It is evident that the affordances of the object affect different users differently and potentially exclude some categories of users (Swift 2017).
Unusual or expensive materials, although probably chosen for status reasons, would also have functioned to deter crooked practices. Obtaining biased dice in these materials, which could be substituted for the originals during the course of play, would be more difficult than accessing dice made in commonly available materials like bone. The hardness of rock crystal would also be a useful affordance as it would inhibit tampering with the shape of the dice. Other properties of these particular materials, such as the transparency of the rock crystal dice and translucency of amber, help guarantee that these dice are not weighted.
Overall, the design features and material qualities of dice in luxury materials suggest that the various types of games played with these dice developed on the principle that there was an equal chance of throwing one through six, and that elite gamers and gamblers knew that a die should be a perfect cube in order to achieve a fair game.
I focus in this section mainly on the data pertaining to bone dice, as this is by far the most common material (others include opaque glass, pottery, wood, stone such as steatite or limestone, and copper-alloy). Classing as ‘regular’ all those dice where the lengths of each face were within 5% of each other, only 20% of bone dice were uniform on this measure. The fact that 20% are good cubes does show some awareness of the concept that uniformity and equality of outcomes are desirable. However, the fairly low incidence of good cubic dice makes clear that the norm for players will actually have been irregular-looking objects. The most common type of irregularity is shortness on one axis (‘flat’ dice in modern gambling terminology), usually that between the one and six face (Fig. 11.3 shows some examples). This phenomenon has already been noted by previous scholars, who suggest that it is mainly an accidental feature relating to production methods and the available dimensions of bone suitable for dice-making (Schmid 1978, 58; Greep 1983, 243–7; Poplin 2004, 62). Additional evidence can also be adduced, which there is not space to consider here (Swift 2017). Recurring features of objects, which were not necessarily intended by the makers, but which have come into existence as a result of particular constraints on production processes, demonstrate the agency of materials and are a reminder that artefact form results from many interrelated factors of which design intention is only one. Bone dice also tend to be much more irregular in their other features (arrangement of spots; treatment of edges and surfaces) than those in luxury materials considered above.
Figure 11.3 Examples of bone one-to-six flats, Petrie Museum, acc. nos. UC59202 and UC59217 from Egypt. Courtesy of the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, UCL.
Figure 11.4 Examples of five-to-six flats in materials other than bone, Petrie Museum, UC59244 (stone), UC59226 (ceramic), UC59240 (stone), and UC59236 (stone), all from Egypt. Courtesy of the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, UCL.
Although many non-cubic bone dice were probably not deliberately produced, dice that are shorter on one axis also occur in materials other than bone, such as ceramic, stone, and wood, showing that not all examples result from constraints in relation to the available dimensions of the raw material (examples in Fig. 11.4). Feugère and Picod also note that there are some bone dice of non-cubic form that have been deliberately made in different shapes; for example, a lozenge-shaped dice from Boscoreale (Feugère and Picod 2014, 30, 41). Further instances of lozenge-shaped dice can also be identified.3 In addition, I have been able to distinguish some instances of dice that have been broken and renumbered (see Fig. 11.5). They have changed shape from a cube to a much flatter form, but the re-numbering suggests that they continued to be used as before and that the alteration to their shape was not felt to be problematic. We can also look at contextual evidence of dice found together as part of gaming assemblages, for instance in burials with counters, game-boards, and other equipment. Individual burial assemblages include both good cubic dice and those of more irregular form.4 This suggests that dice of variable shapes were used together in the same games and differences between them were not considered important.
Figure 11.5 Examples of dice broken and renumbered, National Museum of Ireland, acc. no. 1904.548 from Oxyrhynchus (one uppermost), photo taken with the permission of the National Museum of Ireland and reproduced with the permission of the National Museum of Ireland, and Verulamium Museum, acc. no. 2002.25 (broken and renumbered) from St. Albans (six uppermost), photo author, courtesy of Verulamium Museum, St. Albans.
One particularly ‘flat’ dice form found in bone does appear to be something of a special case. The form consists of an oval plaque only a few millimetres deep, numbered on both the two principal flat sides and the narrow edge faces (example in Fig. 11.6; the spots on back and edge faces confirms they are not to be confused with furniture inlay in bone). Feugère and Picod cite one instance from Claydon Pike, and several further examples have also been found (see Table 11.1).5 The dice have only four possible numbers, in two cases 3, 4, 5, and 6, and so it is likely that they were used for different purposes than normal, six-sided dice forms. Experimental rolling of two of the examples shows that they are strongly biased to the flat surfaces, as one would expect, but do occasionally land on the edge faces.6 Dated contexts suggest a likely second century AD date (Table 11.1).
It was proposed by Feugère and Picod that this dice form can be linked to pre-Roman Iron Age dice of parallelipid shape which also have only four faces numbered three, four, five, and six (example in Fig. 11.6) (Feugère and Picod 2014, 38). The larger number of examples now documented, including an additional one numbered three, four, five and six, support this interpretation. Firstly, the social distribution of the material can be considered. All the known examples come from Romano-British sites, and so this form of dice would appear to represent a localised cultural tradition specific to southern Britain. Three of the examples come from Roman rural settlements, one from a small town, and one from a Roman fort. In general, rural settlements and small towns have less ‘Roman’ material culture profiles than major towns and military bases, and sometimes feature material culture that can be linked to indigenous traditions (e.g. Eckardt 2005). Secondly, the decoration of these dice can be investigated. The Richborough and Claydon Pike oval plaques show derivation from Iron Age traditions in that the spot arrangement is the same as that on some Iron Age parallelipid dice (two semicircles of three spots each at either end of the face, see Fig. 11.6), and different to the Roman norm (two parallel rows of three spots each along the length of the face).7 Finally, the arrangement of spots across the different faces can also be considered, with examples of both Iron Age parallelipid dice, and oval counters, featuring an arrangement in which five is placed opposite six and three opposite four (Table 11.1). Some Roman influence percolating into the design of these items is clearly evident: the example from Wanborough for instance shows a ‘Roman-style’ six spot, and the example from Brentford features numbering with one opposite six, which is the Roman norm. Taken as a whole, therefore, there is strong evidence that these oval plaques in bone show the survival and continuing development of pre-Roman cultural practices in the Roman period in Britain.
Table 11.1 Oval plaques with numbering.
Figure 11.6 Example of oval plaque, from Wanborough, Ashmolean Museum acc. no. AN1955.260 © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, and parallelipid die from Knowth, Ireland, redrawn by Lloyd Bosworth after Eogan 1974, fig. 31 no. 150.
It is evident that the trends displayed by dice in non-elite materials are somewhat different to those of their more luxurious counterparts. The survey of bone dice above shows that this material does not foster a uniformity of gaming experience – indeed quite the reverse. The existence of unusual, specialised forms such as the oval plaques implies a variety of usage including, perhaps, different games or divination practices derived from pre-Roman traditions.
Even when considering only the dice with six faces, which are likely to have been used to play games of Roman origin, there would still be considerable diversity of gaming experience among everyday players. The likelihood of the dice falling on particular numbers would be different from one game to the next according to whether more cubic or more rectangular dice were used. The common occurrence of dice shorter on the axis between one and six would mean that in many dice games, these numbers (the most favoured and disfavoured in Roman gaming), would be the most likely to be thrown, and the game would be more exciting as a result, offering more gains and reverses than a similar, elite dice game. There might also be discrepant knowledge between different individual players. Some might have been more aware than others of how the shape would affect the throw, and could place their bets accordingly.
The concept of a die as an object that ensures an equal likelihood of six different outcomes is much less well-established in dice made from ordinary materials, and it seems likely that ideas of what a die should be, or do, are affected both by the agency of materials (inadvertent drift in the features of dice as a by-product of particular material choices and production processes) and by other concepts of gaming equipment that co-existed with the concept of a cubic die. In Britain this will have included concepts based on parallelipid dice. Divergent dice forms that are developments of pre-Roman traditions can also be identified in other provinces such as Roman Egypt (Swift 2017).
In the case of games or ritual practices derived from Iron Age traditions, exact modes of use and any attendant rules cannot be elucidated, yet the material evidence is still important in suggesting that such activities existed, and provided a means of continuing and affirming non-Roman cultural traditions through daily practice. For the Roman games, some details of their structure and conventions of play are known from written sources, yet it is the archaeological evidence – particularly, the concept of affordances in combination with a detailed analysis of the objects – that sheds light on the experience of using the dice, and the relationships between human and material agencies that exist in their uses.
Artefacts have an obvious contribution to make to Roman social history in providing information about everyday social practice and behaviour. However, in addition to reconstructing aspects of Roman daily living, this case study has also illuminated a number of ways in which artefact study can address broader questions of interest to social historians. These include how culture is assimilated and maintained, how it develops, and what cultural diversity exists, both regionally and across different social groups within the Roman empire.
In previous scholarship, provincial Roman material culture has been interpreted mainly from the perspective of assertions of/transformations in identity, and this is persuasive (e.g. Mattingly 2006; Eckardt 2014). Although some scholars, such as Eckardt, recognise the importance of daily practice (see, for instance, her (2014, 210) emphasis on variant practices that are indicative of regional identities), artefact usage in relation to modes of behaviour and habits of daily practice has not been sufficiently stressed. The focus has tended to be on the potential of material culture to outwardly represent and communicate identities (Pitts 2014, 71), rather than the instantiation of culture through the materiality of actions and experiences, which is clearly crucial both in producing/maintaining a particular worldview and associated cultural conventions, and in bringing about cultural change.
Roman material culture that is found across the empire has usually been discussed from the perspective of cultural homogeneity and similarity (Mattingly 2006, 472). Studies have emphasised that Roman-style material culture could also be used in a multiplicity of ways within provincial society, and needs to be seen within the context of the negotiation of power relations (Webster 2001, 217). This has been explored with the greatest success from the point of view of religious and ritual practice, an area which offers some of the best evidence, although much of it relates only to social elites (e.g. Mattingly 2006, 480–7; Webster 1995; 2001; James 2001, 199–201 discusses the problems with this). Webster stressed, however, the importance of everyday domestic material culture in understanding provincial experience, particularly of the poorer sectors of society (Webster 2001, 223). The present study shows that there is much potential for further investigation of ordinary everyday artefacts, illuminating a diversity of practice and behaviour not available to us from textual sources, and allowing a focus on the non-elite levels of provincial Roman society. Furthermore, focusing on the areas of behaviour and experience allows us to consider to greater effect the discrepant experiences of different social groups. New material culture provided the possibility of different ways of living (Hingley 2005, 106–7, 118; Laurence and Trifilò 2015, 104). The scope for new leisure pursuits provided by gaming equipment was apparently, judging by the quantities of such material found throughout the empire, taken up enthusiastically by provincial populations. Yet a detailed study of the material culture shows that gaming practices at elite and more ordinary levels of society were quite different experiences.
Richard Hingley has noted the way in which new behaviours are informed by past materialities (Hingley 2005, 74). The converse is also true, that introduced artefacts can be used within previous cultures and traditions (Webster 2001, 218). Yet interpretations of artefacts that stress their divergent meanings within differing contexts of use sometimes appear to treat the artefacts themselves as unchanging (e.g. Keay 2001, 130–6; James 2001, 203–6; Mattingly 2006, 470–3), and overlook the way in which changes in usage or understanding of the artefacts in turn impact on the production of new versions of the artefacts (which themselves continue to contribute to behavioural practices). The evidence discussed here reveals more of the process of interaction of new objects with established cultural habits – the way in which, over time and within different contexts, different versions of objects develop that are the product of the intersection of new material culture, such as cubic dice, with previous habits and traditions developed in the context of a rather different material world.
By studying ordinary everyday items such as dice or seal-rings, I have attempted to examine the extent to which introduced mental concepts, which might be termed ‘Roman’, or ‘global’ if a less culturally loaded term is preferred (Pitts 2014, 79), were or were not assimilated into everyday provincial practice and behaviour, or how they were ultimately rejected or subject to an ongoing process of modification. In this way, it is possible to document the gradual abandonment of what had once been established behaviour, and the failures as well as the successes of cultural transmission (a process termed ‘glocalisation’, see Pitts and Versluys 2015b, 14; Robertson 1992). The example of bone dice also shows that the establishment and/or maintenance of cultural norms can be affected by material constraints on production (which could be termed the agency of materials), that may have a significant impact on the production and reproduction of artefacts, associated cultural behaviours and user experiences. From both points of view (the agency of users, and of materials), material studies illuminate the often incremental nature of cultural change. The process of the reproduction of artefacts inevitably introduces unintentional change that has an impact on daily experience. Even with regard to cultural change brought about by the negotiation of power relations, or by the reframing of cultural phenomena within new contexts of use, there is a large component to culture change that is incremental, and worked out through the practices of material living at all levels of society.
Grateful thanks to the Leverhulme Trust for supporting this research with a Research Fellowship, and to all the museums and other organisations who made available their collections for personal study. I would also like to thank Michael Marshall for drawing my attention to a publication reference on oval plaques, and Glyn Davis for providing context information on an amber die from London.
1. Chi-rho motif represented backwards: British Museum acc. nos. 1872,0604.309 (Dalton 1912 cat. no. 25); 1984,1001.1 (also published in Sas and Thoen 2002 cat. no. 232); 1983,1003.1, AF. 215 (Dalton 1901, cat. no. 75), AF.213, AF.214, and AF. 216 (the last three also published in Dalton 1912, cat. nos.29, 30 and 31); Chadour 1994, cat. no. 452; Chadour and Joppien 1985 no. 110; Henkel 1913 cat. no. 1004; Henkel 1913, cat. no. 1864; Worrell 2008, 361, cat. no.10 (Portable Antiquities Scheme LEIC-5FC533).
Chi-rho motif represented frontwards: British Museum acc. no. AF.211 (also published in Dalton 1912, cat. no. 28); Chadour 1994, cat. no. 456; Chadour and Joppien 1984 cat. nos 106, 112 and 118; Henkel 1913 cat. nos. 106, 402 and 1867; Sas and Thoen 2002 cat. nos. 233 and 234; Mawer 1995 nos. D3.Si.5, D3.Si.6, D3.Br.3, D3.Je.1 (Rho-cross).
2. British Museum acc. nos. 1772.0311.220; 1772,0311.224; and 1772,0311.228.
3. From London, London Archaeological Archive and Research Centre OPT81[483]<637>; from Brancaster, Norwich Castle Museum 2011.336.2; probably from Caesarea, Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, Lessingimages.com no. 08-05-09/.
4. E.g. in a burial assemblage from London with a game board, counters and four dice, the percentage difference between the shortest and longest sides was different for each dice; for one the difference was only 7% MSL87[1837]<716>; for the others it was 19%, 28% and 39% (Museum of London MSL87[1837]<714>, <715>, and <717>). Another burial assemblage from the same site contained two dice in a box, one with the shortest side within 5% of the longest side, and so very accurate; the other with the shortest and longest sides different by 14%. Museum of London MSL87[252]<560> and <561>. See Barber and Bowsher 2000 for the burial assemblages. Two dice found in a burial at Ospringe with a set of gaming counters were more similar to each other, both showing one axis shorter by 12% (Maison Dieu Faversham Group XXXVII no. 81006026). See also Whiting 1925.
5. Cowie, Wardle and Thorp (2013, 82) list the known examples (apart from the Claydon Pike plaque). See Table 11.1 for further references to the individual sites. Those from Wanborough and Richborough were personally inspected including experimental throws, see below.
6. In 120 throws, both English Heritage archive Dover no. 4052 from Richborough and Ashmolean Museum AN1955.260 from Wanborough landed 111 times on either the flat upper or lower surface and nine times on one of the edges.
7. E.g. an example from Burrian, see MacGregor 1984, fig. 71a; three examples from Knowth, in a grave dated to 40 BC–120 AD, Eogan 1974, 76 and fig. 31 (for the more recently carried out carbon-dating, see Hall and Forsyth 2011, 1330). All of these feature five opposite six and three opposite four.
* Department of Classical and Archaeological Studies, University of Kent.
