Sokha
SOHA-And; pl. plow, plow; and.
1. A primitive agricultural tool for plowing the land. Smb. from the plow (colloquial; about someone who was just recently a peasant).
2. In Russia in the 13th - 17th centuries: a conventional measure of land, which is a unit of land taxation.
3. Vernacular-colloquial Thick pole, trunk; support, stand (usually with a fork at the end). Tolstaya s. propped up the roof of the barn.
◁ Bipod (see). Sushny, oh, oh. S plowing.
plowI
a primitive rala-type plow with a wide forked working part (rassokha) connected to two shafts into which a horse was harnessed. Until the 20th century the main arable tool of Russian peasants, especially in the non-chernozem zone.
II
a unit of taxation in Russia in the 13th-17th centuries, from which the state land tax was collected - pososhnoye. Initially it was measured by the amount of labor (in the XIII-XV centuries, 2-3 peasant workers made a plow). At the end of the 15th century. the so-called Moscow plow was a tax district of various sizes in different regions of the state. From the middle of the 16th century. The so-called large plow, consisting of one or another number of quarters of land, spread; in 1679 the plow was replaced by household taxation.
Encyclopedic Dictionary. 2009 .
Synonyms:See what “plow” is in other dictionaries:
Sohach, and... Russian word stress
Women initially, a pole, a pole, a whole piece of wood (from drying out, a dry tree?), from where the wood is forked, forked at the end, with a fork; the bipod is still a stand; | plow, old butt or stock of a crossbow; in tul. plow, pillar, stand, support, esp. V… … Dahl's Explanatory Dictionary
Also a support, a fork, supporting a fence, Olonetsk. (Kulik.), also from Sholokhov, Ukrainian. plow support, blr. sokha sokha, other Russian. plow stake, club, support, plow, measure of area (Srezn. III, 470), Serbian. cslav. plow ξύλων, Bulgarian plow stick with... ... Etymological Dictionary of the Russian Language by Max Vasmer
SOKHA, a unit of taxation in Russia in the 13th-17th centuries, from which the state land tax was collected. Originally measured by the quantity of labor. From the middle of the 16th century. the so-called large S., consisting of this or... ... Russian history
Unit of taxation in Russia 13th-17th centuries. Originally measured by the quantity of labor. K con. 15th century the Novgorod plow was equal to 3 compressions, the Moscow plow was 10 Novgorod. From ser. 16th century so-called the large plow consisted of one thing or another...
Sokha: Sokha is a unit of taxation in Rus' Sokha is an ancient Russian arable tool ... Wikipedia
An arable tool (from the end of the 4th millennium BC in the Ancient East, in the Middle Ages and until the 20th century among many peoples of Eurasia). Unlike a plow, the plow does not turn over the layer of soil, but rolls it to the side... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary
SOKHA, plow, wine. sohu, plural sokhi, soham, female 1. A primitive agricultural tool for plowing the land. The tractor and plow completely replaced the plow from the socialist fields of the Soviet Union. 2. An ancient measure of land in ancient Rus', which was... ... Ushakov's Explanatory Dictionary
SOHA, and many others sohi, sokh, soham, female 1. A primitive agricultural tool for plowing the land. 2. In the old days in Rus': a measure of land, which was a unit of taxation. From the plow (colloquial) about someone who entered the circle of the intelligentsia directly... ... Ozhegov's Explanatory Dictionary
Roe deer, omach, gun, bipod, plowshare, measure, ralo Dictionary of Russian synonyms. plow noun, number of synonyms: 12 jaga (2) drynda... Dictionary of synonyms
Books
- Trees, Sokha P., ... Category: For primary school age Series: out of series Publisher: Scooter,
- Bees, Sokha P., Welcome to the magical kingdom of bees! Consider its inhabitants, look into their house, get acquainted with their customs. Watch the bee dance and understand when and why bees dance. Find out... Category:
Many people know that for several centuries, until the end of the 19th century, in the forest zone of the Russian Empire, an ordinary plow remained the most important agricultural tool. It was a universal and most original peasant object, significantly different from the rala and plow. However, until recently, historians found it difficult to answer where and when this arable tool appeared.
The fact is that archaeological materials about plows are very scarce. These are, for the most part, iron tips (coulters) and iron particles of coulters. Before the revolution, during excavations in Staraya Ladoga, it was possible to find a wooden part of an ancient plow, but now, unfortunately, this find has been lost.
The oldest discovered openers were found in Staraya Ladoga. They date back to the end of the 1st millennium AD. Just like the openers found near Veliky Novgorod.
Historians were able to establish that at the turn of the 1st-2nd millennia AD there was a gradual expansion of the geography of the distribution of the plow. Thus, openers originating from Pskov and the Upper Volga region date back to the 10th-11th centuries. Openers from the Vladimir region, Belarus and Latvia date back to the 11th-12th centuries. And by the end of the 12th and beginning of the 13th centuries, plows began to spread in Volga Bulgaria. Thus, we can definitely say that the plow originally appeared in the north-west of our country at the end of the 1st millennium. Namely, in a small territory, conditionally limited to Staraya Ladoga in the north and Veliky Novgorod in the south.
It seems strange that in these forested places, where agriculture developed slowly, the tool in question appeared. However, there is nothing unusual about this. The plow was extremely convenient in wooded areas, which had recently become arable land. The lightness and maneuverability of the Russian tools were immediately appreciated, especially where large roots and stumps were encountered. On moist clay soils, which were abundant in the northwest, the plow did not stick very much in the furrow. She also behaved very well on rocky soils. Because when working in such places it was easy due to the fact that two narrow cutting teeth experienced much less resistance than one, but wide one.
The spread of the plow was supported by the fact that metal coulters did not so much cut and turn over the arable layer as loosen and mix it well. But this contributed to maintaining soil fertility. In addition, a narrow strip of earth remained untouched between the openers, and this prevented water and wind erosion. This also affected the productivity of cultivated lands.
As already mentioned, the spread of the plow went from north to west, south and east. The use of this arable tool is clearly related to areas of coniferous and mixed forests and their specific soils. The routes of introduction of the plow coincide with the directions of Slavic colonization, which went from the northwest to the south and east.
Thus, we can quite confidently consider the plow as a classic element of East Slavic agricultural culture. And this element arose in the specific conditions of northern forest agriculture. And only then it spread among other peoples of Eastern Europe.
SOHA- one of the main arable tools of Russian peasants in the northern, eastern, western and central regions of European Russia. The plow was also found in the south, in the steppe regions, participating in cultivating the land together with the plow. The plow got its name from a stick with a fork called a plow.
The design of the plow depended on the soil, terrain, farming system, local traditions, and the level of wealth of the population. The plows differed in shape, the width of the blade - the board on which the blades (coulters) and shafts were attached, the way it was connected to the shafts, the shape, size, number of blades, the presence or absence of a moldboard - the blade, the method of its installation on the blades and shafts.
A characteristic feature of all types of plows was the absence of a runner (sole), as well as a high location of the center of gravity - the attachment of traction force, i.e. the horse pulled the plow by the shafts attached to the upper part of the tool, and not to the bottom. This arrangement of the traction force forced the plow to tear up the ground without going deep into it. She seemed to be “scratching,” as the peasants put it, the top layer of soil, now entering the ground, now jumping out of it, jumping over roots, stumps, and stones.
The plow was a universal tool, used for many different jobs. It was used to raise new soils on sandy, sandy-stony, gray and sandy loam soils, forest clearings, and carried out the first plowing on old arable lands. They doubled and tripled the arable land with the plow, plowed the seeds, plowed the potatoes, etc. On large landowner farms, all this work was carried out with the help of special tools: a plow, a rale, a rapid tiller, a tiller, a tiller, a cultivator, and a hiller.
The plow grew well on forest soils littered with stumps, roots, and boulders. It could be used to plow not only dry, but also very wet soil, since it did not have a runner on which the earth quickly stuck, making movement difficult. The plow was convenient for a peasant family because it worked freely on the narrowest and smallest arable lands, had a relatively small weight (about 16 kg), was quite cheap, and was easily repaired right on the field. She also had some disadvantages.
The famous Russian agronomist I.O. Komov wrote in the 18th century: “The plow is insufficient because it is too shaky and has excessively short handles, which is why it is so depressing to own it that it is difficult to say whether it is the horse that pulls it or the person who drives it.” , it’s more difficult to walk with her” (Komov 1785, 8). Plowing the land with a plow was quite difficult, especially for an inexperienced plowman. “They plow the arable land without waving their hands,” says the proverb. The plow, not having a runner, could not stand on the ground. When a horse was harnessed to it, the plow moved unevenly, in jerks, often falling to one side or burying the plows deeply into the ground.
While working, the plowman held it by the handles of the bagel and constantly adjusted the move. If the plows went very deep into the soil, the plowman had to lift the plow. If they popped out of the ground, he had to press the handles hard. When the plowman encountered stones on his way, he was forced to either deepen the plows into the ground in order to lift the stone onto them, or take the plow out of the furrow in order to jump over the stone. At the end of the furrow, the plowman turned the plow, having first removed it from the ground.
The work of a plowman was extremely difficult when the horse was in a harness without a bow. Supporting the plow in his hands and adjusting its progress, the plowman took on a third of the entire plow traction. The horse accounted for the rest. The plowman's work was somewhat easier when harnessed to a horse. The plow then became more stable, fell less to one side, and moved more evenly in the furrow, so the plowman did not have to hold it “in his arms.” But for this, a healthy, strong, well-fed horse was needed, since it was the horse that bore the brunt in this case. Another disadvantage of the plow was shallow plowing (from 2.2 to 5 cm) when the field was first plowed. However, it was compensated by double or triple plowing, secondary plowing of the land “trace after trace”, i.e. deepening an already made furrow.
The complexity of the work was overcome by the professional skills of the plowman. We can say with complete confidence that the plow, having a wide agrotechnical range, being economically accessible to most farmers, was the best option for arable implements, satisfying the needs of small peasant farms. Russian peasants valued their plow very much - “mother-nurse”, “grandmother Andreevna”, they advised: “Hold on to the plow, to the crooked leg.”
They said: “Mother bipod has golden horns.” There were many riddles about the plow, in which its design was played out well: “The cow went on a spree, plowed the whole field with her horns,” “The fox was barefoot all winter, spring came and went in boots.” In some riddles, the plow took on anthropomorphic features: “Mother Andreevna stands hunched over, her little feet in the ground, her little hands outstretched, she wants to grab everything.” In the epic about Volga and Mikula, an ideal image is created of the plow with which the peasant hero Mikula plows: The bipod on the bipod is maple, The horns on the bipod are damask, the horn on the bipod is silver, the horn on the bipod is red gold.
The plow is an ancient weapon. Soshnye ralniks are discovered by archaeologists in the cultural layers of the 9th-10th centuries. The first written mention of the plow dates back to the 13th century. This is a birch bark letter from Veliky Novgorod, sent by the owner of the land, probably to his relatives in 1299-1313. Translated, it sounds like this: “And if I send plowshares, then you give them my blue horses, give them with people, without harnessing them to plows.” The plow as an arable tool is also mentioned in the paper document of Dmitry Donskoy, written around 1380-1382. The earliest images of a plow are found in miniatures of the Front Chronicle of the 16th century. The plows that existed in Ancient Rus' were not a complete analogue of the plows of the 19th century.
In pre-Mongol times, plows without plows with coded blades prevailed, while the blades were smaller and narrower than the staked blades of peasant arable implements of the 19th century. Their sizes varied from 18 to 20 cm in length, from 0.6 to 0.8 cm in width. Only in the 14th century did longer spear blades with a pointed blade and one cutting side begin to appear, approaching the type of blade blades of the 19th century. A two-toothed plow with feather guards and a crossbar appeared, according to historians, at the turn of the 14th-15th centuries. or in the 16th century, i.e. when Russian people began to develop large tracts of land with characteristic soil and landscape conditions.
Double-sided plow
A tillage implement with high traction force, used for plowing light soils with a lot of roots, as well as well-plowed lands. The body of the double-sided plow consisted of a dry plow, two blades, a bagel, a shaft, and a policeman. The plow rack was a slightly curved board with a fork - horns (legs) - at the raised end. It was cut down from the butt part of oak, birch or aspen, trying to use strong roots for the horns. The width of the crack was usually about 22 cm.
The average length was 1.17 m and, as a rule, corresponded to the height of a plowman. Iron guards were put on the horns of the plow, which consisted of a tube into which the horn of the cracker entered, a feather - the main part of the guard - and a sharp spout at its end, 33 cm long. Guards could have the shape of a right triangle with a sharp nose, somewhat reminiscent of a triangular knife, there were narrow and long, similar to a stake or chisel. The first guards were called feather guards, the second – code guards. The feather guards were wider than the code ones, about 15 cm, the stake guards had a width of no more than 4.5-5 cm.
The upper end of the cracker was hammered into a bagel - a round or tetrahedral thick block about 80 cm long, with well-hewn ends. The rassokha was driven into it loosely, allowing for some mobility, or, as the peasants said, “slurping.” In a number of regions of Russia, the cracker was not beaten into the bagel, but was clamped between the bagel and a thick beam (frame, pillow), tied at the ends to each other. Shafts were firmly driven into the bagel to harness the horse. The length of the shaft was such that the riders could not touch the horse’s legs and injure them.
The shafts were held together by a wooden crossbar (spindle, stepson, bandage, list, disputer). A rootstock was attached to it (felt, dugout, mutik, cross, tight, string) - a thick twisted rope - or vitsa, i.e. entwined branches of bird cherry, willow, young oak. The rootstock covered the crack from below, where it bifurcated, then its two ends were lifted up and secured at the junction of the crossbar and the shaft. The stock could be lengthened or shortened with the help of two wooden studs located near the shafts: the staves twisted or untwisted the rope.
Sometimes rope or rod stocks were replaced with a wooden, even iron rod, fixed in the crossbar between the shafts. An integral part of the plow was the policeman (klyapina, napolok, moldboard, dry, shabala) - a rectangular iron blade with a slight arch, slightly reminiscent of a gutter, with a wooden handle, about 32 cm long. With rope rootstocks, the handle of the policeman was inserted into the place where they crossed, when rod ones - they were tied to the rootstock, and with a wooden rod it went into a hole hollowed out in it.
The police were shifting, i.e. the plowman shifted it from one plow to another with each turn of the plow. The double-sided plow was a perfect tool for its time. All its details were carefully thought out and functionally determined. It made it possible to regulate the depth of plowing, make an even furrow of the required depth and width, and lift and turn over the soil cut by rakes. The double-sided plow was the most common plow among Russians. It is generally accepted that it appeared in Russian life at the turn of the 14th-15th centuries. or in the 16th century. as a result of the improvement of the plow without police.
One-sided plow
A tillage implement, a type of plow. A single-sided plow, as well as a double-sided plow, is characterized by a high level of traction force, the presence of a wooden crossbar, forked at the bottom, feather guards and a plinth. However, the one-sided plow had a more curved shape than the double-sided plow, and the location of the edges was different. The left feather blade of such a plow was placed vertically to the surface of the ground, while the other lay flat. A metal plate was fixedly attached to the left wing - an elongated blade, narrowed towards the end. On the right side, a small plank - a wing - was attached to the dry land, which helped to roll away layers of earth.
Other methods of installing guards and blinds were also known. Both guards were installed almost horizontally to the surface of the earth. The left winger, called the “peasant”, had a wide feather with a jowl, i.e. with one of the edges bent at a right angle. The right feather guard (“zhenka”, “zhenochka”, “woman”) was flat. The bird lay motionless on the left wing, resting its lower end against its snout. A wooden or iron plate - a moldboard - was inserted into the pipe tube of the right winger.
When plowing, the left coulter, which stood on its edge (in another version it was ribbed), cut the soil from the side, and the right coulter - from below. The earth came to the ground and always spread to one side - the right. The blade on the right side of the dry land helped turn the layer over. Single-sided plows were more convenient for the plowman than double-sided plows. The plowman could work on “one hole” without tilting the plow to one side, as he had to do when cutting a layer on a double-sided plow. The most successfully designed plow was the one with the quill.
Thanks to two closely spaced horizontal guards, the furrow was much wider than in a plow with a vertical guard, in which the width of the furrow was equal to the width of one guard. Single-sided plows were distributed throughout Russia. Especially the plow with the chin. They were one of the main arable tools in the northeastern part of European Russia, in the Urals, Siberia, and were found in the central regions of the European part of the country.
In the second half of the 19th century. Ural factories began to produce more advanced single-sided plows with a quiff. Their rassokha ended with one thick horn-tooth, on which a wide triangular ploughshare with a jowl was put on. A stationary metal blade was attached to the plowshare on top. Plows could vary in the shape of the ploughshare, the location of the blade, and could have the rudiment of a runner characteristic of a plow, but at the same time the attachment of traction force always remained high.
Improved versions of one-sided plows had different names: kurashimka, chegandinka and others. They became widespread in Siberia and the Urals. Improved single-sided plows had a significant advantage over double-sided plows. They plowed deeper, took a wider layer, loosened the soil better, and were more productive in their work. However, they were expensive, wore out quite quickly, and if they broke, they were difficult to repair in the field. In addition, they required very strong horses for the team.
Multi-toothed plow or plow or shaker
A tillage implement with high traction force, a type of plow. A characteristic feature of the multi-toothed plow was the presence on the plow of three to six wide-pointed, blunt blades, as well as the absence of a pole. Such a plow was used for plowing in the spring after autumn plowing of spring crops, covering oat seeds with soil, plowing the ground after plowing with a double-sided plow or a single-sided plow. The multi-toothed plow was ineffective in its work.
The representative of the Novgorod zemstvo, priest Serpukhov, characterized the multi-toothed plow: “When using plows with blunt, wide-pointed plows, like cow tongues, none of the main goals or conditions for cultivating the land are achieved, the plow is almost carried in the hands of the worker, otherwise the earth and oats are drilled, and when lifted This earth is left in heaps and oats in ridges, and not an inch goes deeper into the ground. It is difficult to understand what the purpose of introducing it into agriculture is: peasants sow the land in a row after sowing, or, as they usually say, pile up oats. But observation of her actions does not at all speak in their favor, but rather dissuades them from the opposite” (Serpukhov 1866, V,3). Multi-toothed plows in the 19th century. were quite rare, although at an earlier time, in the 12th-14th centuries, they were widespread until they were replaced by more advanced types of plows.
Plow sokovatka or deryabka, dace, spruce, smyk
A tool for plowing, harrowing and covering seeds with soil, used in a clearing - a forest clearing in which the forest was cut down and burned, preparing the land for arable land. It was made from several (from 3 to 8) armor plates - plates with branches on one side, obtained from the trunks of spruce or pine trees, split longitudinally. The armor plates were fastened with two crossbars located on two opposite sides of the knot.
The materials for fastening them were thin trunks of young oak trees, bird cherry branches, bast or vine. Sometimes armor plates were tied to each other without crossbars. Lines were tied to the two outer armor plates, longer than the central ones, with the help of which the horse was harnessed. Sometimes the outer armor plates were so long that they were used as shafts. The teeth of the knotter were branches up to 80 cm long, pointed at the ends. At the cutting, the layer of earth mixed with ash was loosened with the knotter.
The twig-teeth, strong and at the same time flexible, traced the cutting well, and when they encountered roots, inevitable in such a field, they springily jumped over them without breaking at all. Sukovatka was common in the northern and northwestern provinces of European Russia, mainly in forest areas. Sukovatki, distinguished by the simplicity of their design, were known to the Eastern Slavs back in the era of Ancient Rus'. Some researchers believe that it was the knotweed that was the soil-cultivating tool on the basis of which the plow was created. The development of the plow from the knot occurred by reducing the number of teeth in each of the armor plates, and then reducing the number and size of the plates themselves.
Saban
A low-draft tillage implement, a type of plow, was used to raise the fallow. This weapon was known to the Russians in two versions: a single-bladed and a double-bladed saban. The single-share saban was in many respects the same as the Little Russian plow and consisted of a runner (sole), a ploughshare, a moldboard, a cutter, a stand, a womb, handles, a limber and a beam.
It differed from the Little Russian plow in the ploughshare, which had the shape of a scalene triangle, a more curved cutter, which touched the ground with the lower end of the butt and was located at a considerable distance from the ploughshare, as well as a greater curvature of the beam. In addition, the wooden stand that connected the runner with the beam was replaced here with an iron one, and the ploughshare was connected to the beam with a help - an iron rod. The Saban had one or two iron blades, which resembled wings, attached near the ploughshare. The Saban, like the Little Russian plow, was a heavy, cumbersome tool. He was pulled with difficulty by two horses.
Usually it was harnessed from three to five horses or three to six pairs of oxen. The two-bladed saban had a runner made of two thick wooden beams, at the ends of which there were plowshares in the shape of a right triangle, located horizontally towards the ground. The runner was connected to the handles. With their help, the plowman managed the saban. One end of the strongly curved beam was attached to the runner not far from the ploughshare, the other end was inserted into the front end with wheels. A cutter in the form of a knife was inserted into the beam in front of the plowshares, with the blade directed forward. The blade served as two wooden boards attached to the handles and the beam to the right and left of the sole.
The two-bladed saban was a lighter weapon than the single-bladed one. It was usually harnessed to two horses. The Saban slid well along the ground on a skid, the cutter cut off the layer of earth vertically, and the plowshares cut it horizontally. The plowing depth was adjusted using wedges inserted from above or below the rear end of the row. If the wedges were inserted from above, then the plowing was shallower, if from below, then it was deeper. Sabans were distributed mainly in the provinces of the Lower Volga region and the Urals.
Chapter II.
WORK TOOLS, TOOLS, PROPERTY
The plow is the main arable tool in central European Russia. The design of the plow depended on the soil and topography of the area, farming systems and ethnic traditions. According to the number of openers, single-toothed, two-toothed and multi-toothed plows were distinguished; according to the shape of the openers - code, with narrow openers and feather,
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With wide blades (dumps) - reversible, or double-sided ones, in which the blade was moved from one opener to another, and one-sided ones, with a fixed blade. The most common were two-pronged plows with a crossbar, called Great Russian. The main part of the plow is the rassokha - a thick long wooden board with legs - a fork at the bottom, on which the coulters were mounted. The iron opener served for horizontal cutting of the layer, which moved up the triangular feather and fell off. The openers were installed side by side, inclined to the soil, in different planes. The plow was attached to the shafts with rootstocks (pressures, strings) made of intertwined strings or thick ropes, and its upper end was clamped between two beams, the end and the roller, which served to control the plow, or was driven into the bagel - a beam that fastened the ends of the shaft and served for control. Politsa is an iron oblong tapering blade with a handle, fixed between the rootstocks and on one of the openers. The angle of inclination of the plow was adjusted to change the plowing depth. To do this, they tightened or released the harness on the horse.
Saban - an improved single-tooth, single-sided plow with a runner sole, and therefore more stable, with a knife that cut the soil, two iron or cast iron blades, sometimes on a wheeled limber, with a strongly curved drawbar or low-lying shafts, which increased traction. It was used on heavy steppe soils in the east, in the Lower Volga region, among the Tatars and Bashkirs.
Roe deer (krivusha) - an improved one-sided plow with a wide feather of the left coulter, the edge of which bent upward and, instead of a knife, cut off a vertical layer of earth. The policeman lay motionless on the left opener, and a flat wooden blade was placed on the right. Used on dense, heavy soils, when lifting new trees, etc.
A plowshare is an arable tool with a large ploughshare and a slightly curved blade, with shafts located low above the ploughshare. The plowshare greatly crushed the soil, making harrowing easier, it was more stable, and it was easier to work with it than a plow.
Ralo is an ancient wooden plowing tool in the form of a hook, carved from a tree with a rhizome. It was characterized by low application of traction forces. Single-tooth, two-tooth and multi-tooth rawls were used for plowing, plowing and covering
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The supply of seeds on fallow lands, in the steppe, where grain was sown directly on the stubble. It had no blade, tearing the ground and pushing it apart.
A plow is a tool for heavy, for example virgin, soils, clover fields, etc. It was distinguished by a curved drawbar with low traction, a wheeled front end and high handles. The wooden plow had a thick runner, an iron knife-cutter, a wide iron ploughshare mounted horizontally on the runner, and a moldboard. It was mainly distributed in the southern steppe regions. At the end of the 19th century. purchased iron, often Swedish, plows appear.
The booker is an arable tool similar to a multi-furrow plow, used in the southern Russian provinces, usually for plowing.
The harrow was used for cultivating the soil after plowing and covering the seeds. The oldest was the knot harrow in the form of halves of short spruce logs held together by the ends, leaving rather long knots. Sukovatka was especially popular in the north, where the soil was littered with stones and the nove was often cut after it fell in cleared areas of forest with remaining stumps. More advanced were body harrows in the form of a lattice made of wooden beams or paired thick rods, between which wooden or iron teeth were fixed. Late iron harrows were of a similar type, sometimes zigzag harrows, with zigzag curved iron strips into which teeth were inserted. The harrows were attached to the horse's tracks using an iron ring at one of the corners of the harrow.
When harvesting grain, they mainly used a sickle - an iron plate strongly curved in the form of an irregular semicircle, tapering towards the end; a handle was mounted on the opposite end at a right angle; teeth were often cut on the inner edge. The sickles were both imported foreign and Russian.
Harvesting was women's work. The men harvested the bread with a scythe with “rakes” - a kind of rake with very sparse long teeth attached to the scythe at an angle. A scythe-stand, or litovka, with a long shaft (oskos, scythe), to which a short transverse handle is attached, was also used during haymaking in the meadows. In the north, where there are a lot of stumps, stones or hummocks in the meadows, as well as on the slopes, the pink salmon scythe with a short, slightly curved handle is common. When harvesting hay, wooden rakes and wooden three-forks were used
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Table III
TOOLS
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Table IV
AGRICULTURAL TOOLS
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From a thin tree trunk, diverging into three branches at an acute angle. When clearing manure and doing other work, forged iron forks with three teeth or double forks were used. A flail was used for threshing. It consisted of a long handle, the height of a person (chain, holder) and a short, 50-70 cm and weighing from 600 g to 2 kg working part (threshing, beating, flail), connected by a rawhide belt (puts, fetters). The connection methods were different. For example, a channel about 10 cm deep was drilled in a handle and a transverse hole was punched at its base; a belt tied to the working part was passed through the hole channel and nailed to the handle.
The most common tool was an ax with a fairly wide blade and a wide eye. There were large heavy woodcutter's axes with a relatively narrow blade and a long straight axe, lighter carpenter's axes on a curved axe, and small carpenter's axes - light, with a short, slightly curved axe. For chiseling troughs, trays, and during cooperage, an adze was used - an ax with a slightly curved working part of double curvature and a blade perpendicular to the ax handle. For planing and sanding logs and poles, a scraper was used - a flat, narrow, slightly curved plate with a blade on the working part and two short handles on the sides, set slightly at an angle. In the 18th century For finishing wood processing, a planer appeared - a plane in the form of a large block of hard wood with a wedge-shaped tap hole cut into it, into which a flat piece of iron with a one-sided blade on the working part, fixed in the tap hole with a wedge, was inserted. When planing large planes, a large two-handed bear plane was used. For chiselling, they used chisels of different sizes with a wooden handle inserted into the socket, in contrast to the cutting tool of a chisel, the handle of which was mounted on the shank of the working part. Since ancient times, drills of different sizes have been used for drilling wood, and since the 19th century. - feather drills inserted into the brace. Logs were crosscut with two-handed cross-cut saws, and for sawing lengthwise into boards, since the 18th century. They began to use long two-handed ripping saws, slightly tapering towards one end, with teeth in the shape of an irregular triangle, in contrast to the cross-cut saw, which had teeth in the form of an isosceles triangle. The carpenters also used bow cross-cut and rip saws with a narrow blade fixed between two high posts and a spacer in the middle.
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The ends of the saw were tightened using a bowstring and a short twist that rested against the spacer. One-handed hacksaw saws with blades of different widths were also used. To plan profiles, carpenters used a variety of fillets with semicircular iron, moldings, selectors, zenzubels, etc.
To process fibrous materials (flax, hemp), women used special tools. A grinder is an inclined board or dugout chute with a narrow board with a handle at the end entering it on a hinge. Trepal - something like a large wide wooden knife with a handle. Wide maple combs with frequent narrow teeth on a narrow long handle were used to comb the tow by hand or inserted into the bottom. Spinning wheels for manually making threads from tow were of two types and consisted of a fairly wide blade to which the tow was tied, a thin leg and a bottom placed on a bench; when the spinner sat on the bottom, the blade was located at the level of her face. There were spinning wheels - hoofs, entirely hewn from the butt of a tree, dug up with the rhizome, and composite spinning wheels - pointes, in which the bottom and blade with the leg were made separately. When spinning with a spinning wheel, a spindle was used, on which a twisted thread was wound - a cylindrical stick, tapering at the ends, about 30 cm long, one end of which was thickened, or a slate whorl was placed on it to stabilize the spindle, which rotated like a top.
Self-spinning wheels with a large wheel and a foot drive of various designs appeared quite late and were relatively rare due to their high cost. The working part of the spinning wheel was a roshmanok - a wooden slingshot fitted with curved iron teeth that caught the thread; the slingshot was mounted on an iron spindle along with a simultaneously turned top and a winder on which the thread was wound. The finished threads were then rewound onto sparrows - a large cross made of slats, into the ends of which spindles were inserted, a warping - a cross made of two frames, and a reel - a vertical stand with two horns perpendicular to it and to each other. The weaving mill, or cross, was a massive large frame made of beams, in which a beam rotated - a shaft with wound warp threads, a seam - a shaft on which the finished fabric was wound and in which the stuffing - slats, into which the reed was inserted, moved using footrests. in the form of a comb with warp threads passed through it, and threads - a series of pairwise connected thread loops,
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Assembled on two parallel slats; The warp was also passed through the threads and raised one by one to thread the shuttle.
When embroidering, sewing was used in the form of a low column inserted into the bottom; at its end there was a soft pad or piece of suede, where the fabric was pinned with a pin in a hoop - a light double rim.
When weaving lace, threads wound on bobbins - short, smooth sticks with heads - were secured to a tambourine - a round, tightly padded roller on a sawhorse.
When washing, they used a roller - a massive, slightly curved wooden block with a handle, “knocking” contaminated soapy water out of the fabric. When ironing hard, dried canvas, a rubel was used - a massive block about 60 cm long, slightly curved, with teeth on the working plane and a handle; the fabric was wound on a rolling pin and rolled with the rubel on the table.
At the stove, the housewife used grabbers of different sizes, a poker, a chapel to get out frying pans, and a large wide wooden shovel to plant bread. The grip is made of an iron strip, bent in the form of an open circle so that the bottom of the pot or cast iron fits between the horns of the grip, or stag, and the shoulders sit on the strip; the grip was mounted on a long handle. A chapelnik is an iron strip mounted on a wooden handle with a tongue cut out from its middle and bent back.
In home life, wooden saltboxes with large-capacity lids of two types were used: in the form of a carved armchair or stool and in the shape of a duck. For cooking, cast iron and clay pots of various sizes were used with a rounded body forming shoulders and a narrow bottom (the pots differed from cast iron in having a low rim in the upper part of the body), and for frying, flat clay bowls were used - patches with high, almost vertical sides. Liquid food (kvass, milk, etc.) was stored in clay jars, jars, kubans with a rounded body, a small bottom and an elongated neck. They kneaded the dough and placed the finished baked goods on wide, flat wooden beds, like a tray with low sides. Food products were stored in turned tall containers with lids and in birch bark containers, or beetroot, also with lids. They ate from clay or turned wooden cups with wooden spoons. Clay products were painted, that is, covered with simple glaze, sometimes with modest painting on engobe; wooden products were covered with carvings.
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Table V
HOUSEHOLD Utensils
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Fight or painting. In household use, large clay pots with a capacity of up to two buckets, shaped like pots, were used to store consumable water supplies, make kvass, beer, and wort; intoxicating drinks were served on the table on holidays in valleys, wooden or tinned copper, round in shape, with a spout, or in wooden sips that did not have a spout, as well as in huge scraper ladles, from which drinks were poured into small pouring ladles. The shapes of the ladles were varied and differed mainly in the location and shape of the handle; for example, Kozmodemyansk ladles were standing, with an almost vertical wide flat handle. They drank drinks from copper, tin and wooden glasses and from rather voluminous (up to one liter) jugs assembled from rivets on hoops, with a handle and a lid. In general, cooperage utensils were widely used in peasant life: barrels, half-barrels (crossed), lagoons, tubs, vats, tubs, tubs, gangs.
A special place in the history of the plow is occupied by the Russian plow - a specific tool for cultivating the soil of a forest belt. Unpretentious, cut down from a piece of wood with an ax and a chisel, this tool was for a long time the most common arable tool in Russia, right up to the October Revolution.
The plow appeared in ancient times among the Eastern Slavs, whose main occupation was agriculture and whose main food was bread. They called it zhito, which in ancient Slavic means to live. Under the pressure of the steppe nomads, the Slavs were forced to populate the vast forest areas between the Volga and Vistula; it was necessary to cut down and burn forests for arable land.
A section of scorched forest was called lyad, a section of bushes was called a raw-cut area, and a section of turf was called a pod. The general name of such fields is fires or fires. The farming system that spread here was called slash-and-burn. The peasants sowed small fields reclaimed from the forest in this way with rye, barley, millet and vegetables.
It was important to choose the right area for uprooting. Life experience told the stinkers that the soil in a deciduous forest is better than in a coniferous forest. Therefore, the plots were developed in separate islands scattered throughout the forest. After several harvests, the land became depleted and the yields fell. Then a new site was developed, and the old one was abandoned for many years.
In the northern regions of our country, this system was still used in the recent past. Mikhail Prishvin, after visiting Karelia in 1906, wrote in the essay “In the Land of Unfrightened Birds”: “In a deep forest on a hill, opposite a forest lake of a white lambina, you can see a yellow circle of rye, surrounded by a thick scythe fence. Around this island there are forest walls, and a little further away there are some very swampy, impassable places. This cultural island was all made by Grigory Andrianov...
Even in the fall, two years ago, the old man noticed this place when he was logging. He examined the forest carefully to see if it was thin or very thick! very thin does not yield bread, thick is difficult to cut...
In the spring, when the snow melted and the leaves on the birch became worth a penny, that is, at the end of May or at the beginning of June, he again took the ax and went to “cut branches,” that is, to cut down the forest. He chopped for a day, two, three... Finally the work was over. The felled forest must dry.
The next year, at the same time, choosing a not very windy, clear day, the old man came to burn the dried, caked mass. He placed a pole under its edge and set it on fire from the leeward side. Amidst the smoke that obscured his eyes, sparks and flames, he quickly ran from place to place, adjusting the fire until all the trees were burned. In the forest on a hill, opposite a white lambina, a yellow island turned black - it had fallen. The wind can blow away the precious black ash from the mound, and all the work will be in vain. That’s why we need to start new work now. If there are few stones, then you can directly plow with a special firewood plow with straight coulters without drying. If there are a lot of them, the land needs to be cut down, cut up with a hand-held oblique hook, an old-fashioned picker. When this hard work is finished, the arable land is ready, and next spring you can sow barley or turnips. This is the history of this small cultural island..."
The people glorified courageous heroes, famous for their military and labor feats, in epics:
“Ilya went to his parent, to his father, to that peasant work, he needed to clear the fallen oak log, he cut down the entire oak log.”
But, even with the heroic strength of Ilya Muromets, it is impossible to cut down the forest for arable land without an ax. Therefore, arable farming in forest areas arose at the beginning of the 1st millennium AD, when the Slavs mastered the production of iron. According to F. Engels, only thanks to the use of iron “farming and field cultivation became possible on a large scale, and at the same time an almost unlimited increase in living supplies for the conditions of that time; then uprooting the forest and clearing it for arable land and meadow, which again in it was impossible to produce on a large scale without an iron ax and an iron shovel."
The originality of land development and its use influenced the nature of agriculture and the design of soil-cultivating tools of the Slavs. Obviously, they learned from the Scythian farmers about a loosening soil-cultivating tool - the rale - and used it to cultivate cultivated soft soils. However, such a tool turned out to be completely unsuitable for processing forest clearings for slash-and-burn farming. The horizontally placed plowshare clung to the roots remaining in the soil and broke off.
Therefore, even before the use of iron, the simplest wooden tool, indispensable in slash-and-burn farming, became widespread among the Slavs - the harrow-harrow.
They made the knot right there in the forest from spruce. They cut off the top, cut down small branches and left only large ones, chopped off at a distance of 50 - 70 cm from the trunk. The knot was attached to the horse with a rope hooked to the top of the trunk. While moving, the knot made turns around its axis. Straight teeth - branches easily jumped over the remains of roots and loosened the soil well. The sokovatka was also used for planting seeds sown on the surface of the field.
Subsequently, the Slavs began to produce an artificial knot - a multi-tooth plow. Such tools were used by peasants in the northern regions even at the end of the last century. They were called pumps. The coulter teeth were attached to a special crossbar vertically or with a slight inclination to the soil surface.
This plow design was suitable for processing areas cleared of forest. They were light and had great maneuverability. When encountering roots or stones, the plow came out of the ground, rolling over the obstacle and quickly sinking again. At the same time, it loosened the soil quite well.
The choice of the number of teeth of the plow was determined by the strength of the horse. Therefore, two-pronged and three-pronged plows were used more often. In terms of traction force, they were quite capable of a small and weak ancient Russian horse.
Further improvement of the plow occurred in close connection with the development of the slash-and-burn farming system. Careful clearing of the field, uprooting large and small stumps and their roots created the conditions for cultivating the soil with multi-tooth plows with small iron openers, and later with a two-tooth forest plow or tsapulka, although the openers were still installed vertically to the soil and therefore unloaded and furrowed the ground. Finally, a late type of ordinary plow was created, which has come down to our times.
In the old days, a plow was called a “fork,” any branch, twig or trunk that ends at one of its ends with a fork: two horns or teeth. This is the broad meaning of the word “plow” - the main and oldest. This is confirmed, for example, by the use of the word “plow” to the expression “plowed deer.” The use of this word in the meaning of “arable tool” is later and more specific.
Initially, the Russian people called a plow such an agricultural tool, the working part of which had a forked end. Two seals were placed on the ends. In Russian folklore one can often find proverbs and folk riddles confirming the double-toothed nature of the plow: “The Danila brothers paved the way to the clay”; “Baba Yaga pitches her leg, feeds the whole world, but she herself is hungry.”
The frame (body) of the plow is shaped like a triangle. One side of the triangle is formed by the plow stand, which forms its base. She was called a cracker. The remaining coulter parts were attached to the cracker. The second (upper horizontal) side of the triangle is formed by the shafts of the plow. They were called crimps. The third side, connecting the bottom of the cracked tree with the shafts, was formed by rootstocks.
Rassokha also had other local names: dam, scaffold, paw, plutilo, etc. The scaffold is a thick stick slightly curved and forked at the bottom. It was cut down, as a rule, from the lower part of a birch, aspen or oak tree. Sometimes they chose a tree with roots.
The cracker was processed and secured so that the lower forked end was slightly bent forward. Iron tips - ralniks - were placed on the horns of the cracker, so that their points were turned forward, not downward. The upper end of the plow was connected to the crimps of the plow using a thin rod - a bagel. The fastening was not rigid. Therefore, the cracker had some free movement relative to the bagel. By moving the upper end of the crust over the bagel back and forth, the inclination of the rake blades to the field surface was changed and the plowing depth was adjusted. The bagel also served as a plowman's handle. Therefore, the expression “take up the bagel” meant take up the arable land.
Ralniks were made in the form of triangular knives with a socket for attaching to the horns of the cracker. The rafters were placed on the dry soil not in one plane, but with a groove, so that the soil layer was cut both from below and from the side. This reduced the pulling force and made the horse's work easier. By changing the tilt of the plow, it was even possible to roll the layers to the side.
To plow up uprooted and rocky fields, narrow and long rake blades, reminiscent of a chisel or stake, were placed on the plow. They were called "stake ralniks", and the plow - "stake plow". On old arable lands, cleared of roots and stones, plows with feather blades were used. Such feather plows were the most common. The plowing depth was adjusted by pulling up or lowering the shafts using a saddle to which their front ends were attached. Raising the shafts reduced the plowing depth; lowering them increased the depth.
The depth of plowing was also changed using twig or rope rootstocks. When twisting the rootstocks with a stick inserted between them, the angle between the crack and the crimps decreased and the rootstock was positioned more accurately. Plowing depth decreased. When the rootstocks were untwisted, the plowing depth increased.
It was not easy to control the plow. The plowman needed remarkable strength, since he had to help the horse. The ideal of such a plowman is Mikula Selyaninovich.
The epic depicts Prince Volga at the moment when he meets a free peasant in the field - plowman Mikula Selyaninovich, and glorifies free peasant labor, its beauty and greatness.
“He drove into the open field of the ratai, And the ratai yells into the field, urges him on, Marks furrows from edge to edge. He will go to the edge - there is no other to be seen, That root, all the stones fall into the furrow. The ratai has a nightingale filly, Yes, the ratai has a bipod maple, Ratai's silk gouges."
Mikula Selyaninovich tells Prince Volga:
“They will rip the fry out of the land, They will shake out the land from the small trees, They will knock out the small fry from the fry, I will have nothing to do, good fellow, peasant.”
And when the warriors of Prince Volga Svyatoslavovich try to lift Mikula’s bipod, the narrator says: “They twirl the bipod around, they can’t lift the bipod off the ground.”
Here "yells" - plows; “ratai, oratayushko” - plowman; "omeshik" - an iron ploughshare on a plow; "Ozhi" - the shafts of the plow.
It is interesting that the word “plow” was originally used only when cultivating the soil with a plow, and when cultivating the soil with a plow with a layer turnover, the word “yell” was used. In terms of its capabilities, the plow was a universal loosening type tool. It did not have a device for dumping and turning over the soil layer. But the plow was equally suitable for cultivating forest areas of slash-and-burn farming and for loosening soft cultivated soils.
Talented Russian craftsmen constantly improved the plow, looking for the best design in relation to their conditions, the level of economic development of their farm and the requirements of practical agronomy. Gradually, the plow began to acquire the features of a plow; it had a crossbar that served as a blade, and later a cutting knife.
The installation of a police on a plow has made a significant leap in soil cultivation methods. With such plows it was already possible to cultivate the soil with partial rotation of the formation, good loosening of it, more successfully destroy weeds and, what is very important, plow in manure fertilizer.
Plows with police served as the basis for the creation of more advanced tools: roe deer, saban, Ukrainian plow and other tools that were close in function to the plow.