DOI Artikel:
Editorial
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49000#0215
EDITORIAL
Self praise may be no honour, but the editors
of Tools and Tillage cannot avoid a certain
feeling of satisfaction that the journal has now
reached its twelfth issue. Equally, it is a matter
of satisfaction that it has grown through
team-work between the contributors and the
editors. Fresh material flows in for publica-
tion, and as a rule its academic quality can be
taken for granted. As often as not the contrib-
utors themselves make the choice of what
should be accepted, simply because it is al-
ready of the kind and quality required, and the
Editors’ main task is to ensure that matters
such as specialist terminology, for example,
are sufficiently explained for full international
understanding. A Chinese scholar should be
as easily able to use the material in Tools and
Tillage as one from Denmark or Scotland.
Equally we do not forget that though a spe-
cialist highly familiar with his subject in one
country may seek for comparative material in
others, it does not follow that the subject will
be equally developed everywhere. The Ed-
itors, who have between them experience of
research in several countries, often have to
apply their own experience of local conditions
in trying to balance out problems caused by
such uneven development, as part of the dia-
logue between them and those who provide
the raw material.
The present issue exemplifies such interac-
tion. Aspects of spade cultivation and traction
spades, as well as of early stone ard shares and
the mould-board plough, have previously also
been worked on and published by one or
other of the Editors. The information on trac-
tion spade cultivation in the West Pamirs fully
bears out the results of interpretations and
experiments already carried out, and shows
the use of one and the same implement partly
as a plough and partly as a spade, now as in the
past. Here an age-old technique has survived
to be recorded in this century. From the same
area comes information on ards, which shows
that wooden shares were in use until relatively
recently. The details of the construction of
ards and the techniques of using them is of
particular value, since it comes from an area
about which there has hitherto been little
knowledge of cultivating implements, though
now the ard in use there can be seen as part of
the wide spread of the type in Asia. A gap has
been filled.
Enlightening in a different way is the new
archaeological data on the mould-board
plough from China. The use of an iron
mould-board is now shown to be earlier than
previously thought, and probably developed
there as a means of turning the flooded soils of
rice fields. We now need to re-examine the
evidence from the western half of the globe,
especially from medieval illustrations, bearing
in mind the older civilisation of China - even if
not necessarily postulating direct influence. If
similarities in tools and equipment are found
in two disparate regions, it may indeed be
reasonable to look at early trade routes and
later at the contents of the holds of East India
Company ships, but in assessing the reality of
long-distance links, we should also consider
what associated items there are in each area
which have not travelled. This negative aspect
of cultural connections - or lack of these -
must not be forgotten.
Self praise may be no honour, but the editors
of Tools and Tillage cannot avoid a certain
feeling of satisfaction that the journal has now
reached its twelfth issue. Equally, it is a matter
of satisfaction that it has grown through
team-work between the contributors and the
editors. Fresh material flows in for publica-
tion, and as a rule its academic quality can be
taken for granted. As often as not the contrib-
utors themselves make the choice of what
should be accepted, simply because it is al-
ready of the kind and quality required, and the
Editors’ main task is to ensure that matters
such as specialist terminology, for example,
are sufficiently explained for full international
understanding. A Chinese scholar should be
as easily able to use the material in Tools and
Tillage as one from Denmark or Scotland.
Equally we do not forget that though a spe-
cialist highly familiar with his subject in one
country may seek for comparative material in
others, it does not follow that the subject will
be equally developed everywhere. The Ed-
itors, who have between them experience of
research in several countries, often have to
apply their own experience of local conditions
in trying to balance out problems caused by
such uneven development, as part of the dia-
logue between them and those who provide
the raw material.
The present issue exemplifies such interac-
tion. Aspects of spade cultivation and traction
spades, as well as of early stone ard shares and
the mould-board plough, have previously also
been worked on and published by one or
other of the Editors. The information on trac-
tion spade cultivation in the West Pamirs fully
bears out the results of interpretations and
experiments already carried out, and shows
the use of one and the same implement partly
as a plough and partly as a spade, now as in the
past. Here an age-old technique has survived
to be recorded in this century. From the same
area comes information on ards, which shows
that wooden shares were in use until relatively
recently. The details of the construction of
ards and the techniques of using them is of
particular value, since it comes from an area
about which there has hitherto been little
knowledge of cultivating implements, though
now the ard in use there can be seen as part of
the wide spread of the type in Asia. A gap has
been filled.
Enlightening in a different way is the new
archaeological data on the mould-board
plough from China. The use of an iron
mould-board is now shown to be earlier than
previously thought, and probably developed
there as a means of turning the flooded soils of
rice fields. We now need to re-examine the
evidence from the western half of the globe,
especially from medieval illustrations, bearing
in mind the older civilisation of China - even if
not necessarily postulating direct influence. If
similarities in tools and equipment are found
in two disparate regions, it may indeed be
reasonable to look at early trade routes and
later at the contents of the holds of East India
Company ships, but in assessing the reality of
long-distance links, we should also consider
what associated items there are in each area
which have not travelled. This negative aspect
of cultural connections - or lack of these -
must not be forgotten.