One of the significant advantages any historian of ancient Rome has is a wealth of written material that has survived from 2,000 years ago to help explain to us what the remains of the Roman Empire mean.
For instance, we know how the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum ended up buried under volcanic ash because Pliny the Younger wrote about Mount Vesuvius erupting in 79 AD and destroying the two settlements.
Likewise, we know that the giant concrete arches dot Italy and France today’s landscapes today because many Roman authors dedicated sections of their work to the discussion of the aqueducts.
Julius Sextus Frontinus, a Roman engineer, even wrote a book called On Aqueducts in the first century AD.
But occasionally, historians are stumped by something from Roman times because there is no obvious answer for what it is, and there is also no documentary material from the time that discusses it. Such is the case with the Roman dodecahedra.
Hellbound and Down 