Page:The Ancient Stone Implements (1897).djvu/274

252 They are also known in Scotland. One of granite, found near Wick, is in the National Museum at Edinburgh; as is also another, 20 inches by 12 inches, with a rubber 12 inches by 8 inches, found in a cave near Cullen, Banffshire.

They likewise occur in Shetland. Mr. J. W. Cursiter has a long narrow muller with a curved back, in which are five grooves to receive the fingers, so as to give it the appearance of being a fragment of an ammonite.

Saddle-querns of the same character occur also in France. I have a small example from Chateaudun. One from Chassemy (Aisne) has been figured.

Some were likewise found in the Genista Cave at Gibraltar. They are common in West Prussia and in the Island of Rügen, as well as in Scandinavia generally.

A German saddle-quern, from the ancient cemetery at Monsheim, has been engraved by Lindenschmit. Others are mentioned by Klemm. MM. Siret have also found them in their explorations in Spain.

It will have been observed, in the instances I have cited, that the movable muller or grinding-stone is not spherical, but elongated; but what is possibly the more ancient form approached more closely to a pestle and mortar in character, and consisted of a bed-stone with a slight concavity in it, and a more or less spherical stone for a pounder.

A grinding-stone of granite, with a cavity, apparently for bruising grain by a globular stone, was found in Cornwall, and undressed slabs with concavities of the size and shape of an ordinary soup-plate, are of frequent occurrence in the Hebrides. Others have been found in company with stone balls, in the ancient habitations in Anglesea.

Fig. 171 shows a trough of stone, found at Ty Mawr, Holyhead, by the late Hon. W. O. Stanley, who kindly lent me the wood-cuts of Figs. 170 and 171. The cylindrical grinding-stone or muller was found within it, and has a central cavity on each face, to give the hand a better hold in grinding. A similar appliance was found at Pen-y-Bonc in the same island.

A triturating trough from Cleveland has been figured.