You don't need 12 holes of varying sizes to hold a candle, and these would have been disproportionately expensive to make for that role. The problem is that on

You don't need 12 holes of varying sizes to hold a candle, and these would have been disproportionately expensive to make for that role. The problem is that one can poke similar holes in other proposals. Personally I favour the "proof of skill" explanation but there are also arguments against that.