Within The Society of Ploughman’s Brief History of the Plough, we learn that the very early scratch ploughs were drawn by oxen, camels, elephants and even women folk on occasion.
Line in the sand
Although barely breaking the crust, the soil was disturbed sufficiently to allow different crops to germinate and thrive in otherwise inhospitable areas. These primitive ploughs simply pushed the soil to either side while creating a shallow groove for seeds to fall into. Together with the adoption of early irrigation systems, this helped the desert to bloom.
The Greeks and Chinese went further by adding wheels to the front of their ploughs, which gave the implement much better manoeuvrability. Materials used to construct early implements included oak for the share beam, elm for the draught beam and iron for the shares. Drawings usually show a simple scratch plough without wheels, a ploughman gripping onto the handles and a pair of oxen up front. In practice, I believe it is likely that more than one person was employed to manage the draught animals.
Slipper
Development took place around the single share and would eventually lean towards the mouldboard (or slipper). Besides
