History - quern stones

Milling is the process by which cereal grains are ground into flour. Traditionally, and in some parts of the world to this day, this would have been accomplished by grinding the grain between two stones, a lower, stationary stone called the quern stone and an upper, mobile stone called the handstone. The oldest known flour milling devices are saddle stones (see main image). A saddle stone is a cradle-shaped piece of hard stone which holds the grain. The handstone would have been either a cylindrical piece of stone (held in both hands and drawn across the grain rather like a rolling pin) or a disc with a with a vertical handle on its back (rather like an upside-down mushroom) held in one hand. These hand stones were used to crush the grain and produced a rather coarse flour. In order to make grinding easier, the grain was often malted before being used. More advanced cultures invented rotary querns. These operate in a similar manner to modern millstones and consist of two circular stones, a rotating runnerstone overlying a static bedstone. The grain enters the quern through a hole in the centre of the runnerstone and migrates to the edge as it is ground, emerging from between the stones as a coarsely ground flour. Such rotary querns are hand-powered and as a consequence are limited in size and milling capacity by the strength of their operator. However, they could be much heavier than the handstone used with saddle querns and so could be used with unmalted grain and produce a finer flour. An example of an early British quern is on display at the British Museum. Obviously, such methods are both laborious and time intensive. In addition, they produce only enough ground or cracked grain for a household or extended family.

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Organoleptic properties: Bright, clear appearance, natural smell and color.