Hi Don,

Who says that daisy wheel design has fallen out of favour ? Only a few weeks ago a small frame was cut and raised at Cressing Temple employing this system.

I have come across a number of articles by Timothy Easton in DBRG News (June 1997 & January 1998) on the topic of apotropaic marks and these articles also make reference to daisy wheels. Timothy states that these are known to have existed as early as the 6th century BC.

Timothy makes reference to some books which might assist the serious student in their investigations in this respect including :-

Merrifield, R. 1987, The Archeology of Ritual and Magic, London, Batsford.

Peesch, R., 1983, The Ornament in European Folk Art, New York, Alpine Fine Arts Collection.

Unfortunatly I have not yet had the pleasure of cruising the pages of either of these books but it has to be stated that both of these books preceed the current research work being undertaken by Laurie Smith in his earnest endeavour to connect the use of symbols with practical application. For example this morning Laurie sent me a note from which I shall quote a brief extract :-

"Leigh Court barn near Worcester has nine cruck trusses and two end walls. According to Michael Peach, the architect in charge of the restoration many years ago, there were few carpenter's marks on this building. He did however, spot a daisy wheel and, having had access to his measured drawings, I discovered that it has a five daisy wheel in line floor plan and daisy wheel truss design. The barn is 33 feet across (exactly 2 medieval rods) and has the biggest cruck span yet discovered."

So it would appear that we now have some fact based evidence that demonstrates that geometry in combination with standard units of measurement were employed in medieval building construction. It is this kind of "evidence based" research that we need to expand upon in order to help us sort fact from fiction.

I have contacted the sectretary of the OBR to establish the basis for the statement made on their exhibition panels and I will report back in due course.

We now need to find some good examples of US frames that have daisy wheels on the frame together with a measured plan and cross section of same for evidence based analysis.

Regards

Ken Hume