Photo Gallery

Niger - Ténéré - a millstone Neolithic, found with his crusher.

A Tuareg woman grinds the grain on a stone mill - Camp Idriss - Dider - Tassili n'Ajjer. - Algeria - 1966

The beauty of the gesture of this young Kanuri woman, captured by the lens in Séguédine (Niger), should not make us forget that she is using an authentic prehistoric millstone to crush the grain used to prepare the flour from which we make the pita bread or the tasty couscous. Her gesture is the same as that of her distant ancestors, the same gesture that has also been preserved for us in Egyptian bas-reliefs. This primitive millstone, or "standing millstone", on which the grinder slides to crush the grain, must not be confused with the small Arab stone mill made up of two millstones, one, mobile, rubbing on the other, fixed, by rotation around a common axis. – Kaouar – Niger – 1966

That man populated even the most desolate places in the Sahara is amply attested by the countless worked implements he left there. But the quern-stone for grinding grain, seen here together with the handstone, and elsewhere the ceramic containers still filled with grain seem to have been suddenly abandoned, as if a brutal upheaval had forced the people to flee. Perhaps there was a sudden lack of water ... Historically, it is possible that this happened and those affected all died of thirst. (Erg d' Admer, Algerian Sahara). - Algeria - 1975

This prehistoric millstone was found in the north of Erg Bréard. It is located east of the Aïr Mountains in the Ténéré. - Niger - 1975

Stone mill found near site 11 in Enneri Blaka - Niger - 1975

This fixed stone mill bears witness to an earlier civilisation - Oued Baouet - Niger - Aïr - 1992