EGYPTIAN OR HEBREW THRESHING FLOOR
Cuts on this page used by permission of the Palestine Foundation Fund.
Driving an ox team.—So we can imagine the young Canaanites of those days watching a Hebrew farmer taking his first lesson with a team of oxen. There was a wooden yoke to lay on their necks; there was the two-wheeled farm cart with its long tongue to be fastened to the yoke. There was the goad, a long pole with a sharp point, to stick into the animals' flanks if they should balk. And probably there were many useful tricks to be learned; for example, words like our "Gee" and "Haw" and "Whoa," to shout at the animals when it was necessary to turn to the left or the right or to stop altogether.
Plowing was one of the most difficult of the tasks to be done with oxen. The furrows had to be run straight and true. And the plows were clumsy affairs—not like our shining steel plows to-day—just a long pole with a short diagonal crosspiece, sharpened at the lower end, or tipped with a small bronze share.
Crops of Ancient Canaan
The Hebrews raised the same crops as the earlier Canaanites. The leading ones were wheat, barley, olives, grapes, and figs. The two grain crops were, of course, the most necessary to life. They were planted in the early spring, and harvested in the summer. The grain was sown broadcast, by hand, just as Jesus describes in his great parable of the sower.
Ancient agriculture.—Harvesting and threshing were done almost entirely by hand. The grain was cut with sickles. Some of the old sickles have recently been found by investigators, buried deep in the mounds where ruined Canaanite cities lie hidden. Some of these sickles are of metal, and others are made of the jawbones of oxen or asses, with sharp flints driven into the tooth sockets. After the grain was cut it was tied in bundles and carried to the threshing floor, which was usually a wide, level space of hard ground or rock. Oxen were driven back and forth across the grain on the floor, drawing a heavy weight, until all or nearly all the kernels were shaken or crushed out of the heads. It usually took several days to thresh all the grain from an average-sized field. Then the straw was raked away, and the grain was left mixed with chaff and dust. The next windy day the winnowers, with large "fans," or wooden shovels, came and tossed the mingled chaff and dust and grain in the wind. The kernels of wheat fell back and the chaff and dust were blown away. Last of all, the good clean grain was gathered in baskets and bags, and hauled to the farmer's house, or to the granary, which was a round brick building standing beside or behind his house.
Vineyards and Olives
Another new experience of the Hebrews in Canaan was the culture of grapevines. The vineyards were often on hillsides, especially those facing the south, and hence warmed by the early spring sunshine. The soil on these hillsides had to be terraced so that the rain would not wash it away. The vines had to be planted, trained on trellises, and pruned. At the time of the grape harvest many of the grapes, especially of the sweeter varieties, were set aside for raisins. They were spread out on sheets in the hot sunshine until they were dry and wrinkled. Then they were packed away in jars, where they settled into delicious cakes. Figs were dried and packed in the same way.
The manufacture of wine.—Many of the grapes were used for wine. The juice of these was trodden out in wine-presses. These were large hollows several feet square, cut in the solid rock on the hillside. There were always two of them, one lower than the other, with connecting passages. The bunches of grapes were piled in great heaps in the higher of the two, and then it was great fun for the boys and girls and youths and maidens to jump barefooted and barelegged among the purple clusters, and trample them until the foaming red juice ran down into the lower of the stone chambers, where it was taken up with gourd dippers and poured into skins. The youngsters would come home with their legs and shirts all stained and spotted red.