inches in diameter, found in the Baths. Then there were the stone troughs of the latrine, a portion of a pierced drain cover, and several arch stones. These last consisted of blocks one foot high, four and a half inches thick, and ten inches wide. They are rounded at one end and flat at the other, and have on each side a projecting flange two inches in length. Some of them came from the reducing ditch, others from the neighbourhood of Block XVII, and others again from the débris of the Baths.
Querns
Among smaller stone objects, querns were by far the most richly represented. The broken fragments were very frequently found at the bottom of the rubbish pits. On the whole those of Niedermendig basalt lava appeared to be the most numerous. That these had been imported from the Rhine seems certain. Through the kindness of Herr Heinrich Jacobi, of the Saalburg Museum, a portion of one of the Newstead examples was submitted to Herr Michels, Director of the Company now working the Niedermendig quarries. Herr Michels, who has a wide expert knowledge of such material, had no hesitation in saying positively that the specimen laid before him must have come either from Niedermendig or, less probably, from Mayen in the Eifel. The quarries, as is proved by the inscriptions to Hercules Saxanus in the Brohlthal,[1] have been worked at least from Roman times, and the export of which we find the evidences at Newstead continues to the present day. The number of such querns found in the fort throws an interesting sidelight on the then existing facilities for transport.
As has been noted elsewhere, four of the specimens found were complete. Two of these are shown in Plate XVII. The larger, on the left, came from Pit X; the smaller from Pit XIX. Both appear to date from the first century occupation. In all four cases the iron spindle was preserved. It measured about seven and a half inches in length; the lower end was pointed and was probably inserted in a wooden peg fixed in the hole in the lower stone, while the upper end, which was rounded, was passed through a hole in a thin plate of iron, placed across the opening in the upper stone and having its ends driven into the stone and fixed with lead. In the sides of the upper stones may be noted the loops for the handles by which the necessary rotary motion was given to the quern. A fragment of an ash handle was taken from one of these.
Among the other querns figured in the group are specimens made of granite and of millstone grit. None of these call for special notice, with the
1 C.I.L. xii. 7693 et seq.
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