 |
 |
I've recently been sent some dried out plant material from underneath the floorboards on the first floor of a 16th century house (see attached photo). The sample was mostly cultivated oat, with a little wild oat, tetraploid wheat (probably rivet wheat), bread wheat, apple pips, pea fragments etc and some weeds seeds. The oat that made up most of the sample was odd in that the grain was entirely absent from tightly closed florets. It looks like the grain has perished. I had wondered if it could have been attacked by a granary weevil or fungal infestation? The only insect remains I could find were spider beetle (kindly Id'd by David Smith), which does apparently live on dry materials, old food in mature housing, thatch etc. Does anyone have any suggestions? I'm assuming the material resulted from crops being stored in a first floor room, falling through the floorboards, or it is the remains of animal nesting (there were animal droppings), and some might have been extracted from thatch by animals. If anyone has seen anything similar I'd be interested to know. Regards, Liz Pearson Worcestershire Archaeology The Hive The Butts Worcester WR1 3PB