Record ID: NLM-4BA85A
Object type: PLOUGH
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Quartz plough pebble. About one half of an oval quartz pebble, worn to a flat surface across its putative middle with unidirectional fine scoring marks on the flat surface. Kevin Leahy identifies such objects as plough pebbles, considering they were driven into the mould board of a plough to reduce the erosion of the wood by the heavy wear incurred during the use of a plough, with unidirectional wear patterns arising from this setting. These were first identified in Scandinavia, and their British appearance may signal a minor technological introduction by the Vikings. Suggested date: E…
Created on: Monday 27th November 2023
Last updated: Tuesday 28th November 2023
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Barnetby le Wold', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-C6CA91
Object type: SPINDLE WHORL
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North East Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Pale limestone spindle whorl. A discoid cylindrical form with rounded edges, formerly to be described as bun-shaped, though this term is now decried for its imprecision, cf. Walton Rogers form B. A drilled aperture of diameter 9.4mm is set centrally. Abraded. The mass would make this suitable to spin a fine yarn. The spindle-hole size may indicate an Anglo-Scandinavian rather than an earlier date. Suggested date: Early Medieval, 850-1000 Diameter: 33.1mm, Thickness: 14.7mm, Weight: 20.72gms
Created on: Wednesday 3rd July 2019
Last updated: Wednesday 3rd July 2019
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Brigsley', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-979034
Object type: LINEN SMOOTHER
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Stone probable linen smoother. Fine compacted sandstone water-rolled pebble, collected, utilised and glossed by wear, more markedly on one side than the other. The size, fitted well to the hand, and the wear, resemble those characteristic of linen smoothers. These were made especially from glass in the Anglo-Scandinavian period, or from suitably fine-grained stones. They were used as rubbers to smooth linen in the later stages of its manufacture. Suggested date: Early Medieval, 850-1100. Diameter: 76mm, Thickness: 22.5mm, Weight: 192.87gms
Created on: Monday 13th November 2017
Last updated: Monday 13th November 2017
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'near Market Rasen', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-7FA566
Object type: WHETSTONE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Lead and stone whetstone fragment. The broken end of a fine-grained grey layered stone, possibly a slate but resembling a 'phyllite', with a neatly-cut square section groove around its narrower end, and another at right angles to this on either side. The broken end of the hone has been sheathed in lead, which has held its parts together. The hone may have broken across the site of an original suspension hole. There is a probably drilled transverse hole in the end of the lead sheathing which would replace it. This is an unusual example of the repair of a personal hone so it could be co…
Created on: Friday 26th May 2017
Last updated: Tuesday 30th May 2017
Spatial data recorded.

Record ID: NLM-E1ED34
Object type: WHETSTONE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Published
Stone hone. Grey fine-grained stone, possibly a greywacke, whetstone. Small personal or portable hone with an aperture of diameter 5.5mm, probably drilled from both sides, at one end. Both ends are rounded but the main part of the object has four sides which meet each other at crisp arises. Two opposed sides are dished by wear, while the others retain the curve of the original stone. The fashion for whetstones perforated for wear from a belt or girdle is a feature of the Later Saxon/Anglo-Scandinavian period. This object does not display the characteristics of the imported stones whic…
Created on: Friday 30th September 2016
Last updated: Friday 18th May 2018
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'near Caistor', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-6D2E8B
Object type: WHETSTONE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Ferruginous limestone probable whetstone fragment. Stone shaped like an oversized finger with one markedly smoothed broad surface which is lightly dished by wear and lightly scored by diagonal and transverse grooves suggestive of the sharpening of pointed pins or needles. Limited patches of wear have also partially smoothed the opposite face. Broken raggedly at its wider end. The use of a relatively local stone is likely, which is characteristic of hones of the Later Iron Age to Early Medieval periods. Accompanying material tends to point to the later part of this date-range. Suggeste…
Created on: Thursday 26th May 2016
Last updated: Thursday 26th May 2016
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Binbrook', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-6D1CB4
Object type: WHETSTONE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Fine grained compacted sandstone whetstone fragment. A rectangular section fragment probably from the middle of a whetstone, possibly of hog-backed formAll the faces save for the broken ends are smoothed by wear. Two faces meeting at an obtuse angle are likely to mark the top of the whetstone, and a dished face opposite these faces its most heavily used and worn face. The selection of a local [to northern Britain] rather than an imported stone may suggest a pre-Viking date. The hog-backed form in such stones occurs amongst early medieval finds at Beverley, East Riding of Yorkshire (Fo…
Created on: Thursday 26th May 2016
Last updated: Thursday 26th May 2016
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Binbrook', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-35BE76
Object type: BOWL
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Stone, pale grey in colour with a hard granular texture and rare sparkling and very rare black specks as inclusions: Bowl fragment. Shard from a globular stone vessel of estimated rim diameter c.180mm. The rim is flattened on its top and the interior wall smoothed and also of a slightly darker grey tint, with a sharp change in its direction at the base [otherwise lost]. The outside surface and fracture surfaces are rougher in their texture. The manufacture of plain bowls and other objects of soapstone was a Viking Age feature of occupation on the Orkney Islands. Such an object cou…
Created on: Wednesday 11th November 2015
Last updated: Thursday 12th November 2015
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'near Market Rasen', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-776B49
Object type: WHETSTONE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Fine grained dense grey stone, possible rubber or whetstone. Flat-sided oval ended river-washed pebble; one end chipped. The surface is possibly smoothed by wear overall. The form is probably natural and the stone derived from glacial drift. This might have been used as an improvised polisher for organic materials, including textiles, or alternatively as a whetstone. The use of adventitiously recovered stones for such functions is especially characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon period, sandwiched as it is between eras characterised by more systematic exploitation and marketing of stones …
Created on: Thursday 16th July 2015
Last updated: Thursday 16th July 2015
No spatial data available.

Record ID: NLM-2D13CF
Object type: SPINDLE WHORL
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Chalk spindle whorl. Discoid whorl with a central drilled aperture of diameter 11.7mm, possibly Walton Rogers form B. Weathered. The mass would qualify this for use spinning a yarn, while the aperture size and form indicate an Anglo-Scandinavian date. Suggested date: Early Medieval, 850-1100. Diameter: 39.2mm, Thickness: 11.3mm, Weight: 19.32gms.
Created on: Thursday 18th June 2015
Last updated: Thursday 17th May 2018
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Swinhope', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-7BF3BA
Object type: WHETSTONE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Published
Fine grained grey stone whetstone. A small bar-shaped hone with a drilled hole of diameter 4.2mm for suspension from a belt or girdle. Thinned by heavy wear, which has contributed a smoothly curved end; the object was probably discarded at the end of a long working life, having too little length left for whetting a blade. This material is sometimes described as purple phylite, though this description may embrace stones of various tints gathered from glacial drift as well as from geological sources in Scotland, Norway and elsewhere. 'Phylite' hones are prominent among whetstones of Ang…
Created on: Friday 10th April 2015
Last updated: Tuesday 28th April 2015
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Northorpe', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-22DCC2
Object type: QUERN
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Moderately compacted coarse sandstone, Millstone Grit, albeit of uncertain provenance. Quern fragment, from the top stone of a set. The lower working surface bears three deep grooves with profiles rounded by wear, while the upper stone bears a stepped surface. The grooves were set at an angle to the radius of a circular stone turned by hand with an inserted handle - a procedure less laborious than might be expected as the grains acted as ball bearings as they were fed in, and the flour as a lubricant powder. This is a small part of a stone which would have had an original diameter of …
Created on: Wednesday 5th February 2014
Last updated: Friday 19th February 2021
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Swinhope', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-6719B0
Object type: LINEN SMOOTHER
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Fine-grained Sandstone cobble linen smoother or muller. A handy fragment knapped from a water-smoothed cobble, with the broken face trimmed flat and smoothed by heavy wear, and the other faces smoothed by handling. The use of both improvised and purpose-made smoothers for the finishing of leather or textiles, and the use of mullers for the grinding of vegetable matter for craft or culinary use, is known through Prehistory to the end of the Early Medieval period. A parallel to this example was excavated from 12th-century deposits at Lurk Lane, Beverley (Armstrong et. al. 1991, page 110…
Created on: Thursday 10th October 2013
Last updated: Wednesday 10th February 2021
Spatial data recorded.

Record ID: NLM-9019C2
Object type: SPINDLE WHORL
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North East Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Chalk spindle whorl. Crudely knife cut cylindrical whorl with a central waisted aperture drilled from both sides to a maximum diameter of 14mm, and at its narrowest circa 10mm. An incised interlace pattern is carried over one face, with some lines carried over onto the outer edge. Linear scratches, some intersecting though appearing fresher than the cuts defining the interlace, and less structured in their pattern, appear on the other side of the whorl, along with spalling of that face. The finder notes Viking Age finds from the vicinity, and both form and decoration are consistent wi…
Created on: Tuesday 7th May 2013
Last updated: Wednesday 27th January 2021
Spatial data recorded.

Record ID: NLM-4E8457
Object type: ROTARY QUERN
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Well-compacted Sandstone with sparse shelly inclusions and moderately abundant rounded black stone inclusions of up to 5mm in length. Rotary Quern. Probably the top stone from a quern. The stone is roughly fashioned to plano-convex form with a central hour-glass shaped feed hole drilled from both sides, with a diameter of 78mm at the lower face. The upper, convex, surface includes three adjacent sub-triangular indentations of depths circa 12mm, 13mm and 30mm, along with a further shallower slot on the other side of the feed hole. These may relate to the provision of a handle for rot…
Created on: Friday 8th February 2013
Last updated: Monday 11th February 2013
Spatial data recorded.

Record ID: NLM-529CC7
Object type: SPINDLE WHORL
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Chalk spindle whorl. Knife cut and smoothed whorl with drilled central aperture of diameter 10mm. Probably an example of Walton Rogers' class B whorls, which are cylindrical or doughnut shaped. This would be apt to use in spinning a yarn. Chipped on one face. Suggested date: Early Medieval, 900-1000. Diameter: 34.5mm, Thickness: 12.6mm, Weight: 18.89gms.
Created on: Friday 10th August 2012
Last updated: Wednesday 2nd September 2020
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Middle Rasen', grid reference and parish protected.

Record ID: NLM-75F102
Object type: INGOT MOULD
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Brown ferruginous fine grained Sandstone possible ingot mould. Fragment of rock crudely shaped by the cleavage of flakes from its sides and base, probably adapting a naturally formed shape. The upper surface bears an oval depression of length 54mm, width 24mm and depth 24mm; the base of this hollow is slightly paler and duller than other surfaces. Though this cavity might be fortuitously formed, as by a fossil bivalve shell, its regularity may hints at artificial origin or improvement. Such objects were often improvised: a Viking Age example from Lurk Lane, Beverley was made from a fr…
Created on: Friday 24th February 2012
Last updated: Monday 18th January 2021
Spatial data recorded.

Record ID: NLM-98D297
Object type: GAMING PIECE
Broad period: EARLY MEDIEVAL
County: North Lincolnshire
Workflow stage: Awaiting validation
Dense Micaceous Stone, dark grey in colour, probably an igneous or metamorphic rock; test with magnet shows it to be non-ferrous (observations kindly offered by Wallace Collyer). Small object of sugarloaf form comprising two bun-shaped pieces of the same material joined, probably naturally. Flattened areas may suggest further similar elements may formerly have been attached to sides and base. The object would lend itself to use as a line-weight, tied at the junction of the two elements, or as a playing piece (as for Hnafetafl or similar board-games requiring the distinction of particu…
Created on: Wednesday 3rd February 2010
Last updated: Friday 5th May 2017
Spatial data recorded. This findspot is known as 'Dragonby', grid reference and parish protected.