Mystery of the quincunx’s missing quincunx

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Mystery of the quincunx’s missing quincunx
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A quincunx is the X-shaped pattern of pips on the #5 face of a die.


It’s so-called because the Romans had a common copper coin called an
as, and it was divided (monetarily, not physically) into twelve
uncia. There was a bronze coin worth five uncia called a quīncunx, which
is a contraction of quīnque (“five”) + uncia, and the coin had
that pattern of dots on it to indicate its value.

Uncia generally meant a twelfth of something. It was not just a
twelfth of an as, but also a twelfth of a pound , which is where we
get the word “ounce”, and a twelfth of a foot, which is where we get
the word “inch”.

The story I always heard about the connection between the coin and the
X-shaped pattern of dots was the one that is told by Wikipedia:

>
> Its value was sometimes
> represented by a pattern of five dots arranged at the corners and the
> center of a square, like the pips of a die. So, this pattern also came
> to be called quincunx.
>
>
>

Or the Big Dictionary:

>
> … [from a] coin of this value (occasionally marked with a pattern
> resembling the five spots on a dice cube),…
>
>
>

But today I did Google image search for qunicunxes. And while most
had five dots, I found not even one that had the dots arranged in an
X pattern.

![Pictures of the two sides of an
ancient, corroded, worn, weathered coin. Each one has a four-armed
cross who arms have crossbars at the ends, and the one on the right
also has five dots. The dots are in a cluster in the space between
the cross’s lower and left arms, and are arranged in a row of three
and, closer to the center, a row of two.](https://pic.blog.plover.com/history/quincunx/coin1-th.png)

![Another cruddy coin. The obverse
shows the head of a person, probably Minerva, wearing a plumed helmet.
Above the head is a
row of five dots.](https://pic.blog.plover.com/history/quincunx/coin2-th.png)

![This coin is covered with green
oxide. The obverse is another helmeted Minerva, surmounted by a
horizontal row of five dots. The reverse has a picture of an owl,
and, on the right, a column of five dots.](https://pic.blog.plover.com/history/quincunx/coin3-th.png)

(I believe the heads here are Minerva, goddess of wisdom. The owl is
also associated with Minerva.)

Where’s the quincunx that actually has a quincuncial arrangement of
dots? Nowhere to be found, it seems. But everyone says it, so it must be true.

## Addenda

* The first common use of “quincunx” as an English word was to refer
to trees that were planted in a quincuncial pattern, although not
necessarily in groups of exactly five, in which each square of four
trees had a fifth at its center.
* Similarly, the
Galton Box,
has a quincuncial arrangement of little pegs. Galton himself called
it a “quincunx”.
* The OED also offers this fascinating aside:

>
> **Latin** quincunx occurs earlier in an English context. Compare
> the following use apparently with reference to a v-shaped figure:
>
>
> **1545** Decusis, tenne hole partes or ten Asses…It is also a
> fourme in any thynge representyng the letter, X, whiche parted in
> the middel, maketh an other figure called Quincunx, V.
>
>
>

which shows that for someone, a quincuncial shape was a V and not
an X, presumably because V is the Roman numeral for five.

A decussis was a coin worth not ten uncia but ten asses, and
it did indeed have an X on the front. A five-as coin was a
quincussis and it had a V. I wonder if the author was confused?

The source is
Bibliotheca Eliotæ.
The OED does not provide a page number.
* It wasn’t until after I published this that I realized that
today’s date was the extremely quincuncial 2025-05-25. I thank the
gods of chance and fortune for this little gift.

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Mystery of the quincunx’s missing quincunxA quincunx is the X-shaped pattern of pips on the #5 face of a die.
It’s so-called because the Romans had a common copper coin called an as, and it was divided (monetarily, not physically) into twelve uncia.
So, this pattern also came to be called quincunx.
And while most had five dots, I found not even one that had the dots arranged in an X pattern.
Where’s the quincunx that actually has a quincuncial arrangement of dots?