DOI article:
Lerche, Grith: Ridged fields and profiles of plough-furrows: ploughing practices in medieval and post-medieval times, a study in experimental archaeology, 1
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49002#0141
RIDGED FIELDS
AND
PROFILES OF PLOUGH-FURROWS
PLOUGHING PRACTICES IN MEDIEVAL AND POST-MEDIEVAL
TIMES. A STUDY IN EXPERIMENTAL ARCHAEOLOGY
By
Grith Lerche
PART ONE
Introduction
In the north-western countries of Europe
prehistoric field-systems have been studied
and surveyed for more than fifty years. In
Britain Curwen and Crawford published
their first results already in 1923 and 1928, in
the Netherlands A. E.van Giffen drew at-
tention to similar field systems in 1928, and
two years later Gudmund Hatt demon-
strated fossil prehistoric fields in the heaths
of Jutland in Denmark. His English paper
followed in 1931. The study and mapping of
these systems by Hatt and his assistants in
the 1930s became a model of detailed investi-
gation, only surpassed by Viggo Nielsen’s
survey of excavated systems of ard-traces in
the swamp of Store Vildmose in northern
Jutland after the Second World War (Cur-
wen & Curwen 1923, Crawford 1928, Van
Giffen 1928, Hatt 1930, Viggo Nielsen
1970).
Some sporadic trials with replicas of ards
have been carried out in different countries,
but although there has been an expanding
interest in the use of imitative experiments as
a method of control in archaeological
theory-making, no long term and carefully
planned experiments on the tilling processes
have been published so far. Experimenters
have spent much time consuming effort on
flint-knapping, the hafting of tools, micro-
analyses of marks that could indicate cutting
in different materials, timed experiments in
tree-felling etc., but the degree of interest in
the matter produced and materials restruc-
tured has been relatively minor.
The interest goes back to the 1960s when I
made observations on ard-ploughing in
Arabia, Iran and India, and as Secretary of
the International Secretariat for Research on
the History of Agricultural Implements and
the Royal Danish Academy’s Commission
for Research on the History of Agricultural
Implements and Field Structures in the Na-
tional Museum at Brede as well as an Editor
of “Tools and Tillage” it became my princi-
pal task to inform other interested scholars
throughout the world about the progress of
research in that field.
My own research started, as did that of
many others, with the cultivation processes
carried out with different kinds of ard-
ploughs. But it soon became evident that the
literature on tilling with the proper plough
had not penetrated satisfactorily the problem
of working processes and restructuring of
the soil. Ard furrows are often revealed be-
AND
PROFILES OF PLOUGH-FURROWS
PLOUGHING PRACTICES IN MEDIEVAL AND POST-MEDIEVAL
TIMES. A STUDY IN EXPERIMENTAL ARCHAEOLOGY
By
Grith Lerche
PART ONE
Introduction
In the north-western countries of Europe
prehistoric field-systems have been studied
and surveyed for more than fifty years. In
Britain Curwen and Crawford published
their first results already in 1923 and 1928, in
the Netherlands A. E.van Giffen drew at-
tention to similar field systems in 1928, and
two years later Gudmund Hatt demon-
strated fossil prehistoric fields in the heaths
of Jutland in Denmark. His English paper
followed in 1931. The study and mapping of
these systems by Hatt and his assistants in
the 1930s became a model of detailed investi-
gation, only surpassed by Viggo Nielsen’s
survey of excavated systems of ard-traces in
the swamp of Store Vildmose in northern
Jutland after the Second World War (Cur-
wen & Curwen 1923, Crawford 1928, Van
Giffen 1928, Hatt 1930, Viggo Nielsen
1970).
Some sporadic trials with replicas of ards
have been carried out in different countries,
but although there has been an expanding
interest in the use of imitative experiments as
a method of control in archaeological
theory-making, no long term and carefully
planned experiments on the tilling processes
have been published so far. Experimenters
have spent much time consuming effort on
flint-knapping, the hafting of tools, micro-
analyses of marks that could indicate cutting
in different materials, timed experiments in
tree-felling etc., but the degree of interest in
the matter produced and materials restruc-
tured has been relatively minor.
The interest goes back to the 1960s when I
made observations on ard-ploughing in
Arabia, Iran and India, and as Secretary of
the International Secretariat for Research on
the History of Agricultural Implements and
the Royal Danish Academy’s Commission
for Research on the History of Agricultural
Implements and Field Structures in the Na-
tional Museum at Brede as well as an Editor
of “Tools and Tillage” it became my princi-
pal task to inform other interested scholars
throughout the world about the progress of
research in that field.
My own research started, as did that of
many others, with the cultivation processes
carried out with different kinds of ard-
ploughs. But it soon became evident that the
literature on tilling with the proper plough
had not penetrated satisfactorily the problem
of working processes and restructuring of
the soil. Ard furrows are often revealed be-