Milling wheat and barley with rotary querns: the Ouarten women (Dahmani, Kef, Tunisia) NATÀLIA ALONSO, FRANCISCO JOSÉ CANTERO, RAFEL JORNET, DANIEL LÓPEZ, EVA MONTES, GEORGINA PRATS & SÍLVIA VALENZUELA Alonso, N., Cantero, F.J., Jornet, R., López, D., Montes, E., Prats, G. & Valenzuela, S. 2014. Milling wheat and barley with rotary querns: the Ouarten women (Dahmani, Kef, Tunisia). AmS-Skrifter 24, 11–30, Stavanger. ISSN 0800-0816, ISBN 978-82-7760-158-8 Women of the Ouarten Berber tribe (Kef, western Tunisia) still manually perform many of the domestic tasks related to the preparation of cereals for consumption: cleaning, roasting and milling with rotary querns. hese tasks have been studied from an ethnoarchaeological perspective within the framework of the research project “Ouarten: ethnoarchéologie d’une tribe berbère en Tunisie (Kef)”. he manual cleaning and grinding of bread and durum wheat, the cleaning, roasting and milling of hulled barley, as well as the cooking of the diferent cereals, have been recorded. his study presents the diferent steps of each process, the present-day tools and technical skills, as well as the diferent products, by-products and residues resulting from each stage of the operation. Natàlia Alonso, Universitat de Lleida, Facultat de Lletres, Pl. Víctor Siurana, 1, 25430 Lleida, Catalonia, Spain. Phone: (+34) 973 70 31 57. E-mail: nalonso@historia.udl.cat Francisco José Cantero, Universitat de Barcelona, Facultat de Geograia i Història, C. Montalegre, 6, 08001 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Phone: (+34) 93 402 10 90. E-mail: jsibpalki@hotmail.com Rafel Jornet, Món Iber ROCS SL, C. Santa Anna, 25, 08800 Vilanova i la Geltrú, Catalonia, Spain. Phone: (+34) 645856587. E-mail: rafeljornet.rocs@gmail.com Daniel López, Av. del Pèlag, 17, esc. A, 3er 1a , Catalonia, Spain. Phone: (+34) 633 702 001. E-mail: danilopezreyes@gmail.com Eva Montes, Universidad de Jaén, Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación, Campus Las Lagunillas, 23071 Jaén, Spain. Phone: (+34) 953 21 25 69. E-mail: evamontesmoya@hotmail.com Georgina Prats, Universitat de Lleida, Facultat de Lletres, Pl. Víctor Siurana, 1, 25430 Lleida, Catalonia, Spain. Phone: (+34) 973 70 20 28. E-mail: gprats@historia.udl.cat Sílvia Valenzuela, Departament of Archaeology, University of Sheield, Northgate House, West Street, Sheield S1 4ET, United Kingdom. Phone: (+44) 114 22 22 951. E-mail: s.valenzuela@sheield.ac.uk Keywords: milling system, rotary quern, ethnoarchaeology, archaeobotany, Tunisia 11 He goes away from here and posts himself Besides his quern,’ and on a little shelf Which ixed to it for other uses did he wall support, he puts his faithful light. hen from his garment both his arms he frees; Begirt was he with skin of hairy goat And with the tail thereof he thoroughly Doth brush the stones and hopper of the mill. His hands he then doth summon to the work And shares it out to each, to serving was he left directed and the right to th’ toil. his turns about in tireless circles and he surface round in rapid motion puts, And from the rapid thrusting of the stones he pounded grain is running down. he left relieves its wearied fellow hand, And interchanges with it turn about. hereafter country ditties doth he sing