The Structured Deposition of Querns: The Contexts of Use and Deposition of Querns in the South-West of England from the Neolithic to the Iron Age Submitted by Susan Rosina Watts, to the University of Exeter as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Archaeology, March 2012. This thesis is available for Library use on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. I certify that all material in this thesis which is not my own work has been identified and that no material has been previously submitted and approved for the award of a degree by this or any other University. (Signature)………………………………………………… 1 Acknowledgements I take this opportunity to express my thanks to everyone who helped me during the course of my research. In particular I would like to thank the following: all who supplied photos and illustrations, you are acknowledged in the captions; the Historic Environment Record officers who sent me details of the querns they hold information on, the staff of the Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro, Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter and Museum of Somerset, Taunton who allowed me access to their collections of querns and the staff of the Somerset Record Office who willingly fetched me nearly every file and folder from the South Cadbury Archive. My thanks are also due to the archaeological units who shared information with me in advance of publication. I especially thank Dr. Andy Jones, James Gossip and Charlie Johns, Cornwall Historic Environment Service and Dr. Richard Tabor, South Cadbury Environs Project. My grateful thanks are due also to Henrietta Quinnell who has freely given of her knowledge of the prehistoric south-west, Dr. Caroline Hamon, University of Paris, for sharing details of her research in Mali with me, Ann Dick for translating German articles and Dr. Richard Sandover for the GIS base maps. I am also grateful to Dr. Carl Knappett from whose Masters Degree classes on material culture I benefitted greatly and my second supervisor, Dr. Marisa Lazzari again particularly for her advice on matters pertaining to material culture. I especially thank my supervisor, Dr. Linda Hurcombe for her guidance and helpful and inspiring discussions. My research was helped financially by a bursary from the Archaeology Department of Exeter University and I am also most grateful to The Harold Hyam Wingate Foundation for the award of a scholarship, part-funding the first four years of my research. My greatest thanks, however, is to my husband, Martin, for his encouragement and support throughout. 2 Abstract It is now widely assumed that many artefacts found in the prehistoric archaeological record were not casually discarded as unwanted material but were deposited in features and contexts with structure and meaning. This appears to include saddle and rotary querns for they are often found whole and apparently still usable or, conversely, deliberately broken. Analysis of the structured deposition of querns in the south-west of England shows that they were deposited in features on both domestic and non-domestic sites. Furthermore, the location and state of the querns, together with the artefacts found in association with them, indicates that they were deposited with different levels and layers of meaning, even within the same type of feature. The deposition of querns appears to have pervaded all aspects of prehistoric life and death suggesting that they played a role above, but nevertheless related to, their prime task of milling. An exploration of the object biography of querns demonstrates the importance of what are often considered to be mundane tools to subsistence communities. Each quern has its own unique life history, its meaning and value determined by the reasons that gave cause for its manufacture, the material from which it was made, the use(s) to which it was put and who used it. However, all querns share points of commonality, related to their function as milling tools, their role as transformers of raw material(s) into usable products (s), their association with women and the production of food, and the movement of the upper stone. Through these, symbolical links can be made between querns and agricultural, human and building life cycles, gender relations and the turning of the heavens. The reason for a quern‟s deposition in the archaeological record may have drawn upon one or more unique or common values. 3 Contents List of Figures 9 List of Appendices 11 List of Accompanying Material 11 Definitions 12 Chapter 1 Introduction 13 1.1 Preface 13 1.2 The Concept of Structured Deposition 14 1.2.1 Depositional processes and the formation of the archaeological record 16 1.2.2 Levels and types of structured deposit 17 1.3 Why Use Querns to Investigate Structured Deposition? 19 1.4 Previous Work on the Structured Deposition of Querns 21 1.4.1 The corpus of British literature 21 1.4.2 The European perspective 29 1.4.3 A world-wide phenomenon 31 1.4.4 Discussion 31 Chapter 2 Objectives and Methodology 35 2.1 Research Objectives 35 2.2 Methodology 35 2.2.1 The study area 36 2.2.2 Categories in the structured deposition of querns 37 2.2.3 Collation and limitations of the data 38 2.2.4 Dating parameters 41 2.2.5 The database 41 2.2.6 The analysis 42 Chapter 3 On Querns: Nomenclature and Early Chronological Development 44 3.1 Introduction 44 3.2 Nomenclature 44 3.3 Early Chronological Development 47 3.3.1 The Saddle Quern 47 3.3.2 The Rotary Quern 51 3.4 The Relevance of Quern Typology to Structured Deposition 56 4 Chapter 4 The Object Biography of Querns 58 4.1 Introduction 58 4.2 Querns and Object Biography 60 4.3 Manufacture 61 4.3.1 Conception 61 4.3.2 Desired end product 62 4.3.3 Decoration 64 4.3.4 Procurement of raw material 65 4.3.5 Manufacturing implements and technique 66 4.3.6 Two stones make a quern 69 4.3.7 Trade and procurement 70 4.4 Primary Functions and Uses 72 4.4.1 A woman‟s world 72 4.4.2 A social whirl 74 4.4.3 Products and transformation 78 4.4.4 Maintenance 81 4.5 Secondary Functions and Reuse 83 4.6 Discard and Deposition in the Archaeological Record 84 4.7 Object Biography and the Structured Deposition of Querns 86 Chapter 5 The Symbolic Properties of Querns 89 5.1 Introduction 89 5.2 Querns as Symbols of Gender 91 5.3 Querns as Symbols of the Harvest, Fertility and Feasting 93 5.4 Querns as Symbols of Death 95 5.5 Querns as Symbols of Transformation 97 5.6 The Cosmic Mill 99 5.7 The Colour of Querns 100 5.8 Querns as Part of the Body of the House 102 5.9 Wholes, Parts and Orientation 103 5.10 The Spirit of the Quern 105 5.11 Symbolism and the Structured Deposition of Querns 106 Chapter 6 An Overview of the Querns found in Structured Contexts within the Study Area 108 6.1 The Dataset 108 6.2 The Sites 108 5 6.3 The Querns 111 6.4 Contexts of Deposition 112 Chapter 7 The Neolithic Period 114 7.1 Setting the Scene: Activity Locales and Subsistence 114 7.2 Querns from the Study Area 117 7.3 Contexts of Deposition 118 7.3.1 Pits 118 7.3.1.1 Earlier Neolithic pits 118 7.3.1.2 Later Neolithic pits 123 7.3.2 Other depositional contexts 124 7.3.2.1 Occupation spreads and in situ querns 124 7.3.2.2 Hearths 126 7.3.2.3 Middens 126 7.3.2.4 Clearance cairns 127 7.3.2.5 Enclosure walls 127 7.3.2.6 Funerary contexts 128 7.3.3 Associated artefacts 128 7.4 Discussion 128 7.5 Conclusions 130 Chapter 8 The Bronze Age 133 8.1 Setting the Scene: Activity Locales and Subsistence 133 8.2 Querns from the Study area 136 8.3 Contexts of Deposition 138 8.3.1 Structural contexts 139 8.3.1.1 Walls and floors 140 8.3.1.2 Postholes 142 8.3.1.3 Gullies 148 8.3.2 Occupation layers and hearths 149 8.3.3 Pits 152 8.3.4 Demolition and abandonment deposits 156 8.3.5 Other pits 158 8.3.6 Ditches 161 8.3.7 Middens 164 8.3.8 Funerary contexts 165 8.3.9 Miscellaneous features 168 6 8.3.10 Associated artefacts 170 8.4 Discussion 172 8.5 Conclusions 178 Chapter 9 The Iron Age 180 9.1 Setting the Scene: Activity Locales and Subsistence 180 9.2 Querns from the Study Area 182 9.3 Contexts of Deposition 185 9.3.1 Structural contexts 185 9.3.1.1 The clay spreads at Glastonbury and Meare 185 9.3.1.2 Walls and floors 188 9.3.1.3 Postholes 189 9.3.1.4 Gullies and drains 190 9.3.2 Occupation layers and in situ querns 191 9.3.3 Heaths, ovens and kilns 194 9.3.4 Pits 195 9.3.4.1 Generally 195 9.3.4.2 Querns in pits 198 9.3.5 Fogous 205 9.3.6 Middens 207 9.3.7 Enclosure walls, banks and ramparts 208 9.3.8 Ditches 209 9.3.9 Human burials 210 9.3.10 Cave deposits 212 9.3.11 Watery deposits 212 9.3.12 Quern quarries 213 9.3.13 Associated artefacts 213 9.4 Discussion 215 9.5 Conclusions 220 Chapter 10 Conclusions and Future Directions 222 10.1 Looking Back 222 10.2 Sites and Querns 224 10.3 Contexts of Deposition 225 10.4 Categories of Deposition 228 10.4.1 Separation of upper and lower stones 228 10.4.2 Pairs of stones 229 7 10.4.3 Quern hoards 230 10.4.4 Fragmentary versus complete quernstones 230 10.4.5 Complete quernstones 233 10.4.6 Querns in situ 234 10.4.7 Stone type 234 10.4.8 Associated artefacts 235 10.5 Part of the Wider Picture 236 10.6 Looking forward 238 10.6.1 First impressions 238 10.6.2 Comparable surveys 239 10.6.3 Joining fragments 240 10.6.4 Use-wear analysis 240 10.6.5 Backtracking the Neolithic 241 10.7 Conclusions 243 Figures 249 Appendices 296 Bibliography 319 8 List of Figures 1.1 Activity and refuse areas of a Rarámuri residence, Mexico 1.2 An Endo compound, Kenya 1.3 Bronze Age pit, Winnall Down, Hampshire 1.4 Neolithic pit, Upper Deal,