In Scotland, querns are of frequent occurrence in the ancient brochs and hill forts. In one of the former, at Kettleburn,[1058] Caithness, a stone in preparation for a quern was found; in another, in Aberdeenshire, an upper stone, 18 inches in diameter, was discovered. Another stone of the same size, surrounded by four border stones to prevent the scattering of the grain in grinding, was discovered in a subterranean chamber in a hill fort at Dunsinane,[1059] Perth. A curious pot-quern, the lower stone decorated with a carved human face, was found in East Lothian, and is engraved by Wilson.[1060]
Some interesting notices of Scottish querns have been given by Sir Arthur Mitchell.[1061]
The upper stone, ornamented with raised lines, shown in Fig. 180, from a cut kindly lent me by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, was found in trenching a moss in the parish of Balmaclellan, New Galloway, with some curious bronze objects of “late-Celtic” workmanship.[1062]
An upper stone (18 inches), ornamented in a nearly similar way, was found near Stranraer,[1063] Wigtownshire, and another, with a tribrach instead of a cross, at Roy Bridge,[1064] Inverness-shire. |260|
Some ornamentally carved upper stones of querns, one of them with spiral and leaf-shaped patterns upon it, much like those on the bronze ornaments of the “late-Celtic” Period, have been discovered in Anglesea.[1065]
Querns of green sandstone are stated, by Sir R. Colt Hoare,[1066] to be numerous in British villages and pit-dwellings in Wiltshire, as indeed they are in other counties,[1067] though formed of various kinds of grit. They rarely occur in barrows, though burnt granite querns have been found with burnt bones in cromlechs in Jersey.[1068]
Some observations on querns by the Rev. Dr. A. Hume, are published in the _Archæologia Cambrensis_.[1069] As these utensils belong, for the most part, to Roman and post-Roman times, I have thought it needless to enter into any more minute description of their forms, or of the circumstances under which they have been found.
Before proceeding to the consideration of other forms of implements, it will be well to say a few words with regard to those which have served for grinding, polishing, or sharpening tools and weapons, and more especially such as there is every reason to suppose, were employed to give an edge or finish to other materials than metal, though the whetstones of the Bronze Period must not be passed by unnoticed.