Sickles, Hooks, and Scythes in Ireland

The adoption of any agricultural implement has important implications for related farmingmethods. A change from one implement to another can usually be correlated with wide-ranging changes in other cultivation techniques. This article summarizes the evidence for the use, in the past, of sickles, hooks and scythes in Ireland. Most discussion will centre on technical reasons for the relatively late use of the scythe as a grain-cutting implement. The aim is to provide data which will complement those documented in other contexts.Distinguishing an implement as a sickle, a scythe, or a reaping hook has proved difficult for some researchers. White, writing of Roman agricultural implements, identifies a ‘scythette’ which he describes as ‘intermediate between sickle and scythe

Biology · Complement (music · Geography · Hook · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History · Engineering · History

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