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Millstone
Millstones or mill stones are stones used in gristmills, for grinding wheat or other grains. They are sometimes referred to as grindstones or grinding stones. Millstones come in pairs: a convex stationary base known as the ''bedstone'' and a concave ''runner stone'' that rotates. The movement of the runner on top of the bedstone creates a "scissoring" action that grinds grain trapped between the stones. Millstones are constructed so that their shape and configuration help to channel ground flour to the outer edges of the mechanism for collection. The runner stone is supported by a cross-shaped metal piece ( millrind or rynd) fixed to a "mace head" topping the main shaft or spindle leading to the driving mechanism of the mill ( wind, water (including tide) or other means). History The earliest evidence for stones used to grind food is found in northern Australia, at the Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land, dating back around 60,000 years. Grinding stones or g ...
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Millstones
Millstones or mill stones are stones used in gristmills, for grinding wheat or other grains. They are sometimes referred to as grindstones or grinding stones. Millstones come in pairs: a convex stationary base known as the ''bedstone'' and a concave ''runner stone'' that rotates. The movement of the runner on top of the bedstone creates a "scissoring" action that grinds grain trapped between the stones. Millstones are constructed so that their shape and configuration help to channel ground flour to the outer edges of the mechanism for collection. The runner stone is supported by a cross-shaped metal piece ( millrind or rynd) fixed to a "mace head" topping the main shaft or spindle leading to the driving mechanism of the mill (wind, water (including tide) or other means). History The earliest evidence for stones used to grind food is found in northern Australia, at the Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land, dating back around 60,000 years. Grinding stones or grindsto ...
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Quern-stone
Quern-stones are stone tools for hand- grinding a wide variety of materials. They are used in pairs. The lower stationary stone of early examples is called a saddle quern, while the upper mobile stone is called a muller, rubber or handstone. The upper stone was moved in a back-and-forth motion across the saddle quern. Later querns are known as rotary querns. The central hole of a rotary quern is called the eye, and a dish in the upper surface is known as the hopper. A handle slot contained a handle which enabled the rotary quern to be rotated. They were first used in the Neolithic era to grind cereals into flour. Uses of quern-stones An old Gaelic proverb is "The quern performs best when the grindstone has been pitted." Design of quern-stones The upper stones were usually concave while the lower ones were convex. Quern-stones are frequently identifiable by their grooved working surfaces which enabled the movement of flour. Sometimes a millrind was present as a piece of wood (or ...
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Gristmill
A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that has been separated from its chaff in preparation for grinding. History Early history The Greek geographer Strabo reports in his ''Geography'' a water-powered grain-mill to have existed near the palace of king Mithradates VI Eupator at Cabira, Asia Minor, before 71 BC. The early mills had horizontal paddle wheels, an arrangement which later became known as the " Norse wheel", as many were found in Scandinavia. The paddle wheel was attached to a shaft which was, in turn, attached to the centre of the millstone called the "runner stone". The turning force produced by the water on the paddles was transferred directly to the runner stone, causing it to grind against a stationary "bed", a stone of a similar size and shape. This simple arrangement required ...
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Watermill
A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in the production of many material goods, including flour, lumber, paper, textiles, and many metal products. These watermills may comprise gristmills, sawmills, paper mills, textile mills, hammermills, trip hammering mills, rolling mills, wire drawing mills. One major way to classify watermills is by wheel orientation (vertical or horizontal), one powered by a vertical waterwheel through a gear mechanism, and the other equipped with a horizontal waterwheel without such a mechanism. The former type can be further divided, depending on where the water hits the wheel paddles, into undershot, overshot, breastshot and pitchback (backshot or reverse shot) waterwheel mills. Another way to classify water mills is by an essential trait about their location: ti ...
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Millrind
A millrind or simply rind is an iron support, usually four-armed or cross-shaped, for the upper ("runner") stone in a pair of millstones. The rind is affixed to the top of the square-section main shaft or spindle and supports the entire weight of the runner stone, which can be as much as several tons. The face of a runner stone usually has a carved depression, called the "Spanish cross", to accommodate the millrind. The rind is necessary because the grain is fed through the runner stone's central hole, so the spindle cannot be inserted through it like a cartwheel on an axle. Mechanism A later refinement, replacing the cross, was to mount a ''mace'' onto the spindle, which fitted into a gimbal let into the runner stone. The device allowed the runner stone to move in two planes and thus follow the nether (stationary) stone more closely, but great care had to be taken to ensure that its weight was properly balanced. The separation of the nether stone from the runner, controlling th ...
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Neolithic
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts of the world. This "Neolithic package" included the introduction of farming, domestication of animals, and change from a hunter-gatherer lifestyle to one of settlement. It began about 12,000 years ago when farming appeared in the Epipalaeolithic Near East, and later in other parts of the world. The Neolithic lasted in the Near East until the transitional period of the Chalcolithic (Copper Age) from about 6,500 years ago (4500 BC), marked by the development of metallurgy, leading up to the Bronze Age and Iron Age. In other places the Neolithic followed the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age) and then lasted until later. In Ancient Egypt, the Neolithic lasted until the Protodynastic period, 3150 BC.Karin Sowada and Peter Grave. Egypt in ...
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Tide Mill
A tide mill is a water mill driven by tidal rise and fall. A dam with a sluice is created across a suitable tidal inlet, or a section of river estuary is made into a reservoir. As the tide comes in, it enters the mill pond through a one-way gate, and this gate closes automatically when the tide begins to fall. When the tide is low enough, the stored water can be released to turn a water wheel. Tide mills are usually situated in river estuaries, away from the effects of waves but close enough to the sea to have a reasonable tidal range. Cultures that built such mills have existed since the Middle Ages, and some may date back to the Roman period. A modern version of a tide mill is the electricity-generating tidal barrage. Early history Possibly the earliest tide mill in the Roman world was located in London on the River Fleet, dating to Roman times. Since the late 20th century, a number of new archaeological finds have consecutively pushed back the date of the earliest ti ...
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Windmill
A windmill is a structure that converts wind power into rotational energy using vanes called sails or blades, specifically to mill grain (gristmills), but the term is also extended to windpumps, wind turbines, and other applications, in some parts of the English speaking world. The term wind engine is sometimes used to describe such devices. Windmills were used throughout the high medieval and early modern periods; the horizontal or panemone windmill first appeared in Persia during the 9th century, and the vertical windmill first appeared in northwestern Europe in the 12th century. Regarded as an icon of Dutch culture, there are approximately 1,000 windmills in the Netherlands today. Forerunners Wind-powered machines may have been known earlier, but there is no clear evidence of windmills before the 9th century. Hero of Alexandria (Heron) in first-century Roman Egypt described what appears to be a wind-driven wheel to power a machine.Dietrich Lohrmann, "Von der ...
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Bush Medicine
Bush medicine comprises traditional medicines used by Indigenous Australians, being Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Indigenous people have been using various components of native Australian flora and some fauna as medicine for thousands of years, and many still turn to healers in their communities for medications that provide physical and spiritual healing. Traditional methods of healing have underwritten the development of non-Indigenous medicines throughout history. One notable example would be the development of seasickness medication which enabled the Invasion of Normandy in World War II. Today, traditional healers and medicines have been incorporated into modern clinical settings to help treat sick Indigenous people within some healthcare networks. Overview Traditional medicine has been defined as the sum of the total knowledge, skills and practices based on the theories, beliefs and experiences indigenous to different cultures, whether explicable or ...
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Grain
A grain is a small, hard, dry fruit ( caryopsis) – with or without an attached hull layer – harvested for human or animal consumption. A grain crop is a grain-producing plant. The two main types of commercial grain crops are cereals and legumes. After being harvested, dry grains are more durable than other staple foods, such as starchy fruits ( plantains, breadfruit, etc.) and tubers ( sweet potatoes, cassava, and more). This durability has made grains well suited to industrial agriculture, since they can be mechanically harvested, transported by rail or ship, stored for long periods in silos, and milled for flour or pressed for oil. Thus, the grain market is a major global commodity market that includes crops such as maize, rice, soybeans, wheat and other grains. Grains and cereal Grains and cereal are synonymous with caryopses, the fruits of the grass family. In agronomy and commerce, seeds or fruits from other plant families are called grains if they resem ...
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