any guesses

Hi Everyone, Any guesses?
I found this at my dad's farm and I remember seeing it there as a kid. It is wooden and as you can see really sculptural. I don't think it is a pulley of any kind. It really looks like it was handmade and it seems really old. The farm was cleared and settled in the 1870's.
I have not figured out what to do with it or how to display it. Perhaps, if anyone has a clue about it's original function that might help.
Thanks, Finbar

 

Maybe part of an old grinding mill mechanism.

 

neat item......what size is it......

 

Great idea. I'll google some images and see if I can see something like it.

 

Churn dasher

 

It is about 11" diameter, 3" think as I remember.
Churn dasher... let me check that out, thanks! F

 

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I'm with @Barn Owl on sort of mill thingy... I was at "maybe textile mill thingy", but that's everything I've got.

 

Mr Jivvy offered that it could have something to do with rope making (such as cable laid rope), but I was not able to find anything to match.

Admittedly, I didn't spend a lot of time on it.

 

OK...this should have been done a while ago...but I got lazy....
So...
I can't see that a rod went thru it to be a dasher.
It's hard to make out where the wear was involved but 3 of the leading edges have taken the most damage...
The rim seems to show a lot of use...so maybe it spun......
Twisting rope into a bundle....possible???

Just some out loud observations......

 

Maybe it's a part of a seed spreader.

 

thanks everyone, i need to look into the rope idea