loughing and Sowing.
row, in Job xxxix, 10, means literally to break the clods, and is so rendered in Isa. xxviii, 24; Hos. x, 11; and for this purpose the means used have been already indicated. The passage in Job, however, is important, It shows that this breaking of the clods was not always by the hand, but that some kind of in- strument was drawn by an animal over the ploughed field, most probably the rough log which is still in use. See Harrow, The readiest way of brushing over the soil is by means of a bundle composed simply of thorn bushes. In highly-irrigated spots the seed was trampled in by cattle (Isa. xxxii, 20) as in Egypt by goats (Wilkinson, i, p. 39, 2d ser.).
I. Harvest.— The custom of watching ripening crops and threshing-floors against theft or damage ^Robin- son, i, 400 ; ii, 18, 83, 99) is probably ancient. Thus Boaz slept on the floor (Ruth iii, 4, 7). Barley ripen- ed a week or two before wheat; and, as fine harvest weather was certain (Prov. xxvi, 1; 1 Sam. xii, 17; Amos iv, 7), the crop chiefly varied with the quantity
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Ancient Egyptians Treading in the Grain.
4. Goats tramping in the grain, when sown in the field, after the water had subsided: 0 is sprinkling the seed from the basket lie holds in his left band, the others are driving the goats over the ground. The hieroglyphic wind above, Sk, or Skai\ signifies •' tillage," and is followed by the demonstrative sign, a plough.
of timely rain. The period of harvest must always have differed according to elevation, aspect, etc. (Rob- inson, i, 430, 551). The proportion of harvest gather- ed to seed sown was often vast, a hundred-fold is men- tioned, but in such a way as to signify that it was a
limit rarely attained (Gen. xxvi, 12; Matt, xiii, 8). Among the Israelites, as with all other people, the har- vest was a season of joy, and such is more than once alluded to in Scripture (Psa. cxxvi, 5; Isa. ix, 13). See Harvest.
5. Reaping. — In the most ancient times the corn ■was plucked up by the roots, which continued to be the practice with particular kinds of grain after the sickle was known. In Egypt, at this day, barley and " door-
13 12 11 10 as joins.
Ancient Egyptian Harvest-scene, t. The reapers; 2. A reaper drinking from a cup: 3, 4. Gleaners — the first of these asks the reaper to allow him to drink; 5. Carrying the ears in a rope basket — the length of the stubble showing the ears alone are cut off; S. Winnowing; 10. The tritura, answering to our threshing; 12 drinks from a water-skin suspended in a tree; 14. Scribe who notes down the num- ber of bushels measured from the heap ; 16 checks the account by noting those taken away to the granary.
Palestine, by the consideration pointed out by Russell (Ar. //. of Aleppo, i, 74), who states that " wheat, as well as barley in general, does not grow half as high as in Britain ; and is therefore, like other grain, not reaped with the sickle, but plucked up by the roots with the hand. In other parts of the country, where the corn grows ranker, the sickle is used." When the sickle was used, the wheat was either cropped off under the ear or cut close to the ground. In the former case, the straw was afterward plucked up for use ; in the latter, the stubble was left and burned on the ground for manure. As the Egyptians needed not such manure, and were 1 1 economical of straw, they generally followed J the former method ; while the Israelites, whose j lands derived benefit from the burned stub- ble, used the latter, although the practice of i- cutting off the ears was also known to them
(Job xxiv, 24). Cropping the ears short, Ancient Egyptians gathering the Dcora and Wheat. \ > ' '' & ,. . . , , '
1. Plucking up the plant bv the roots; 2. Striking off the earth from fhe Egyptians did not generally bind hem
the roots; 3. Reaping wheat. into sheaves, but removed them in baskets.
Sometimes, however, the}- bound them into
ra" are pulled up by the roots. The choice between I double sheaves ; and such as they plucked up were
these modes of operation was probably determined, in | bound into single long sheaves. The Israelites ap-
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12 3 4
Ancient Egyptians binding Wheat in Sheaves. 1. Reaping; 2. Carrying the ears; 3. Binding them in sheaves put up at 4.
pear generally to have made up their corn into sheaves (Gen. xxxvii, 7; Lev. xxiii, 10-15; Ruth ii, 7, 15; Job xxiv, 10; Jer. ix, 22; Mich, iv, 12), which were collected into a heap, or removed in a cart (Amos ii, 13) to the threshing-floor. The carts were probably similar to those which are still employed for the same purpose. See Wagon. The sheaves were never made up into shocks, as with us, although the word occurs in our translation of Judg. xv, 5 ; Job v, 26 ; for the orig- inal term signifies neither a shock composed of a few sheaves standing temporarily in the field, nor a stack of many sheaves in the home yard, property thatched, to stand for a length of time ; but a heap of sheaves laid loosely together, in order to be trodden out as quick- ly as possible, in the same way as is done in the East at the present day (Brown, Antiq. of the Jews, ii, 591). Such heaps were sometimes fancifully arranged in the form of helmets (PliSSlpi, lehubaoth") or of turbans ("ID^:?, lekumasoth') [but see other explanations of these terms in Buxtorf, Lex. Talm. col. 1960, 1051], or of a cake (XTin!?, lecharara'), as in the following illustration from Surenhusius (iMischna, ut sup.). See Sheaf.