Harrowing Experiences

Construction:   The harrow itself is made from pine 1 x 3 boards, pegged togatgher with red oak pins, and fortified with  clinched nails before pegging. In period, white oak would have been the most likely material. We did try red  oak for the cross pieces and failed dismally - we just did not have the woodworking tools needed. The single tree and hames were purchased antiques from the early 1900s - the design on those is virtually unchanged  from the 1500s. 

Historic Background: A harrow is an implement for breaking up and smoothing out the surface of the soil. In this way it is distinct in  its effect from the plough, which is used for deeper tillage. Harrowing is often carried out on fields to follow the  rough finish left by plowing operations. The purpose of this harrowing is generally to break up clods (lumps of  soil) and to provide a finer finish, remove weeds left by the plow and to cover seed after sowing.  

In Neolithic times, soil was harrowed, or cultivated, with tree branches; shaped wooden harrows were used  by the Egyptians and other ancient peoples, and the Romans made harrows with iron teeth. Harrows are mentioned in the Bible and are as ancient as the plow. The first such implements were nothing more than a carefully selected tree trunk or limb with protruding branches, that scratched the soil when pulled along by hand or behind an animal. England’s Parliament felt it necessary, in 1664, to abolish “as being cruel and injurious to the animals,” the practice of tying, with a rawhide cord, the brushy limb of a tree to a horse’s tail for use as a  

harrow. 

In the SCA time period, harrows were made in both a triangular (easier to maneuver around rocks and other hazards) and a square or rectangular version. They were basically wood frames with teeth made from wood or iron. This design continued up until the early 1900s, when curved harrow teeth with a metal frame replaced the  

wooden frames. (See harrow catalogue from the mid-1800s at right.) 

Construction:  The collar is made of linen and stuffed with straw and hay. It is a slightly more fitted version, ca. 1500s.   We used hemp rope for the attachments and traces, as would have been done in period.

Historic Background:  Long before the horse collar harness, there was the less efficient throat-girth harness. This type of collar was used in ancient Chaldea, both Sumeria and Assyria (1400–800 BC), ancient Egypt during the  New Kingdom (1570–1070 BC), Shang Dynasty China (1600–1050 BC), Minoan Crete (2700–1450 BC), Classical Greece (550–323 BC), and ancient Rome (510 BC–476 AD).  Plows and carts were pulled using harnesses that had flat straps across the neck and chest of the animal, with  the load attached at the top of the collar, above the neck, in a manner similar to a yoke. These straps pressed  against the horse’s sterno-cephalicus muscle and trachea which restricted its breathing and reducing the pulling power of the horse. Thus, the harder a horse pulled, the more strongly it choked off its own breathing. Be cause of these physical constraints, oxen were used in preference to horses for heavy work, as they do not have  this problem due to anatomical differences and could be yoked to their loads. 

In 1972, Spruytte published Ancient Harness Systems which argued that there were at least three ancient traction systems shown in art, none of which choked the horses. The shoulder traction (ancient Egyptian) and breast traction (Greek and Roman) artwork had been mis-seen and mis-drawn as a composite that matched neither. This he sought to demonstrate by building reproduction chariots and harness, and running them with  suitable teams. These had to be borrowed ponies as horses were too large for the surviving Egyptian chariot he used as a model. 

A study of Han Dynasty (206 BCE – 220 AD) representations of horse drawn vehicles, compared with those  from other ancient civilizations, shows that the heavier Chinese vehicles, carrying up to six people, could be pulled by a single horse. Much lighter vehicles from other parts of the world could carry a maximum of two people but often required four horses. This could only be possible with a more efficient harnessing system which did not restrict the horse’s ability to breath, and seems to indicate that the breast-strap harness had  already been invented by the late Warring States period (480-221 BCE). 

After the breastcollar harness, the next and final evolutionary stage was the collar harness. The collar allows a  horse to use its full strength when pulling, essentially allowing the horse to push forward with its hindquar ters into the collar. The fully developed collar harness was developed in Southern and Northern Dynasties  China during the 5th century AD. The design is seen in painted Chinese frescoes, one from 520–524 AD  (with shafts projecting beyond the horses chest for sternal traction), and another circa 600 AD (Sui Dynasty).  

The horse collar eventually spread to Europe c. 920 AD, and became universal by the 12th century. The  Scandinavians were among the first to use a horse collar that did not constrain the breathing passages of the  horses. Prior to this development, oxen still remained the primary choice of animal for farm labor, as all the  previous harnesses and collars could only be worn by them without physical penalty. Additionally, the yoke  used to harness oxen were made exclusive to each individual animal. However it was sometimes difficult to  cultivate the land; based upon soil condition, it may have taken up to sixteen oxen to effectively use a single  heavy plow. This made it difficult for farmers who lacked the capital to sustain such large numbers. 

The adoption of the horse collar removed the previous physical restrictions the old harness had on the animal, and allowed the horse to be able to exert its full strength in plowing. Originally, the structure of the  old harness forced the horse to literally pull its workload; the horse collar’s development instead allowed the  horse to push its workload, increasing the efficiency of its labor output. 

Following the introduction of the horse collar to Europe and its use being clearly evident by 1000 AD, he use  of horses for ploughing became more widespread. Horses work roughly 50 percent faster than oxen. With  the collar, combined with the horseshoe, the heavy plow, and other developments in the agricultural system,  the efficiency of the European peasant farmer in producing food increased, allowing further societal development in Europe. The surplus in food allowed labor specialization as farmers could change their occupation  and focus on other skills, such as the purchase and selling of goods, resulting in the emergence of a merchant  class within European society. The horse collar was one of the factors in the ending of the feudal system and transition from the Middle Ages. 

The original European horse collars were round and almost doughnut shaped, and generally linen stuffed with straw or other readily found materials that would yield a pliable collar that was still firm enough to support the hames, or  wooden pieces to which the traces that pulled the plow or harrow were attached. By the 1600s we are seeing more shaping coming into play, and eventually the collar develops into the leather shaped collar with integral hames we  still use today, seen at right. 

A singletree (swingletree in the UK) is a bar attached at the center of the hitch on a wagon, carriage or plow  which is hooked at either end to the traces of the horse’s harness. The function of the singletree is to balance

the weight being pulled. The singletree is mounted on a post or pin at the hitch point of the vehicle so that  it can pivot. That is it’s entire job! The name singletree came from the same medieval word of the same use. The traces (the straps by which the animal pulls) attach to its ends, and the vehicle is pulled from its middle. 

The center of the singletree may be bolted directly to the body of the vehicle, this bolt pulling the vehicle  along. Alternatively it may hang loosely by a chain or strap from the body of the vehicle, and in this case the  pull is taken by chains from the centre of the bar to the ends of the axle. 

The manuscripts show harrows being used both with and without singletrees. We chose to incorporate one into our model because it balances the harrow beautifully on the turns, taking the stress off the horse. You will see this in the video.