The heavy plough spreads

The story

Two ways of ploughing the land

To plough means to open the earth into furrows, to sow seed and to let the soil breathe. In ancient times, around the Mediterranean, a simple plough was used, called the “light plough” or “ard”: a pointed wooden stake, sometimes with an iron tip, pulled by a pair of oxen. It scratched the surface of the ground but did not turn it over. Because Mediterranean soil is dry and light, this was enough: the field was ploughed twice, crosswise, before sowing.

In Northern Europe, however, the soil is very different. On the plains of Germany, northern France, England and the Netherlands the earth is clayey, heavy, often full of water. A light plough slid over it without really moving it, and the heavy rains turned it into mud. The best fields, therefore, were only the sandier, lighter soils, and a lot of good land stayed covered by woods and marshes.

A plough with three pieces of iron

Already known in Roman times, between the early Middle Ages and the year 1000 a more powerful plough, the “heavy plough”, spread widely in the North. It had three main parts. In front was the coulter, a vertical blade that cut the sod. Then came the ploughshare, a horizontal blade that cut it free from below. Last was the mouldboard, a curved board that lifted it and turned it over to the side. In this way the earth was turned over in one go, and the grass that was on top ended up underneath, where it rotted and fertilised the field.

It was a big machine, often with wheels, and very heavy to pull. It needed four, six or even eight oxen, which few peasants owned on their own. Neighbours pooled their animals and in turn ploughed everyone's fields. To cut down on turning, the fields were made long and narrow, because turning the plough with the whole team of oxen was tiring, and so the long strips of land were born that can still be seen in many European countrysides.

The ploughman's work was hard. One man drove the animals with a whip and a goad, another held the handles of the plough to keep the furrow straight. Ploughing was done in autumn and in spring. In the illustrated calendars of the Middle Ages, the month of ploughing is often shown by just such a peasant with his team of oxen.

Horses, collars and horseshoes

With the heavy plough came other novelties. The rigid collar, resting on the horse's shoulders, allowed the animal to pull with all its strength without choking, as happened with the old straps. Horseshoes protected the horses' hooves in the mud. The horse, faster than the ox, could do more work. In the North more and more peasants used horses for ploughing.

People also began to organise the fields better: instead of letting half the land rest every year, it was divided into three parts, one sown with winter wheat, one with barley, oats or pulses in spring, and one left to rest. This system, the three-field rotation, gave a bigger harvest and made it possible to keep more animals.

How much did it really change?

A famous American historian, Lynn White, wrote in the 1960s that the heavy plough had changed European society, helping to bring about bigger villages and organised communities. Historians today are more cautious: the dates and places of its spread are still debated, and many think the changes were slower and more varied than White imagined. But many agree that, between the year 1000 and the 13th century, the countryside of the North produced more grain than before, also because new lands were brought under cultivation.