Tools & tillage: a journal on the history of the implements of cultivation and other agricultural processes (4.1980/1983)

CLEARING GROUND

5


Fig.2. Field partly cleared of stones. The field is about 1 acre and contains 14 large cairns and more
than 100 earth-bound stones. The soil is, however, full of boulders and is ploughed by the ard. Halinas
parish, Uppland, Sweden. Photo: Nordic Museum 1914.

Feld, von dem ein Teil der Steine entfernt wurde. Das Feld miEt 1 Acre (ca. 4047 m2) und enthalt 14
groEe Steinhaufen und uber 100 Steine in der Erde. Der Boden ist jedoch voller Gerbil und wird mit
dem Haken gepfliigt. Pfarrbezirk Halinas, Uppland, Schweden.

clear today that implements tilling the soil
deeply bring stones up. However, even in
times when only a double plough was used,
stones would come up. Some say it is frost
that brings up stones. This they prove by
saying that very large boulders which were
impossible to remove, had been dug deep
into the earth and after about fifteen years,
there the boulder was again as the plough
passed it. On the other hand - say others -
the soil seems to get “lower” as the years
pass.”2
In this description we find some of the

problems that the Swedish farmer also had to
deal with for several centuries.
The further back we go the more state-
ments there are about the difficulties that
stone in the fields caused the farmers. Two
hundred years ago stone was considered an
enemy, which you could not quite conquer
with the prevailing techniques and the avail-
able resources. The activities of clearing new
ground during the 18th and 19th centuries
have, however, changed the profile of many
rugged parts of Sweden from a stony desert
to fertile land, and the stone walls that have