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That probably answers the positional notation aspect we'd been discussing on the other board Isaac Send a noteboard - 10/03/2013 04:12:32 AM

View original postIf, in the letters, one sees the digamma, which looks like an F (because it's the origin of the Latin letter F). It wasn't used in writing but it was used, solely and exclusively, to represent the number 6. Similarly, qoppa (which looked like a Q) represents only 90, and sanpi (which looked just weird) represented 900. If you add those three letters to the 24 letters of the Greek alphabet, you get 27, or 3 sets of 9s, which were used for 1-9, 10-90 and 100-900, respectively.


View original postOn a 20-sided die, if the letters represent numbers, you wouldn't get to qoppa or sanpi, but you would get digamma.

If I read you right, they wouldn't need the equivalent of 2 symbol identical 10 sided dice or 2 20's with repeats to generate an even distribution of random larger numbers, they could just have one die with their tens digit symbols and one with their singles. So if they wanted two D20's to generate 1-100 or 1-1000 they just have 2 copies of each of the appropriate symbols on a die and presumably two of whatever passed for the analogue to zero, blank spot maybe. Say, one die alpha through theta? 2 of each plus 2 blanks, then another 10-90 2 each and 2 blanks and 100-900 2 each and a pair of blanks if they wanted to go that high.

So this die Joel referenced, can't be numerical, because 20 unique symbols on a die wouldn't mean anything to them, it would be gibberish, the first 20 unique math symbols would generate equal odds of 1-9, 10,20,30...90, 100, 200 that wouldn't serve any obvious purpose so they wouldn't be numbers.

Assuming that makes sense? It is, haha, all Greek to me.



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This message last edited by Isaac on 10/03/2013 at 04:39:55 AM
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Demotic is a Greek term, so capitalizing it or not really doesn't change anything. Tom - 09/03/2013 03:13:17 PM 826 Views
Ah, I did not realize the Greek term was reserved for modern Greek; thanks. Joel - 09/03/2013 07:11:16 PM 915 Views
Greek letters haven't changed in about 2800 years Tom - 09/03/2013 09:05:30 PM 831 Views
So we do not know WTF numbers the die represents, if it does indeed represent numbers? Joel - 09/03/2013 10:15:59 PM 788 Views
There is a simple way to figure out if they represent numbers. Tom - 10/03/2013 03:33:10 AM 828 Views
That probably answers the positional notation aspect we'd been discussing on the other board Isaac - 10/03/2013 04:12:32 AM 817 Views
Based on the photo shot, I can't see how the die would be used in a percentile fashion. Tom - 10/03/2013 03:18:43 PM 783 Views
Thanks, it still leaves the purpose rather uncertain but random number generator seems ruled out Isaac - 10/03/2013 05:10:05 PM 1141 Views
Those are just the first 20 letters (of 24) of the Greek alphabet. Tom - 10/03/2013 06:57:46 PM 712 Views
One would THINK so, yes.... Joel - 11/03/2013 04:54:05 PM 1010 Views
First vertical row: Ε Α Β. Second: Z Η Θ Ι Κ. Third: Ρ Σ. Tom - 12/03/2013 12:27:15 AM 704 Views
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