A recent ethnographic study (Hamon and Le Gall 2013) of several Minyanka villages on Mali may shed some light on how milling tools were seen. Among the Minyanka, grinding flour is women's work, and little girls beginning about age six begin their long apprenticeship to learn to take care of a house. Women may store their heavy querns in a shared open space, but each woman has her own quern, and each family their own querns.
Hamon and Le Gall report that querns have long lifetimes, usually exceeding one generation, and they frequently change owners, handed down as part of a bridal trousseau or inherited on the death of the mother. New ones are made by the "blacksmith", generally a male who is a specialist in metalworking; worn out ones are reused to process pottery temper or color pigments, and sometimes used as part of the building foundations for new granaries or houses.
Sources
Hamon C, and Le Gall V. 2013. Millet and sauce: The uses and functions of querns among the Minyanka (Mali). Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 32(1):109-121.
Also see the bibliography.
