Editing Threshing (section)

==History of threshing==
[[File:Dreschflegel.jpg|thumb|A grain flail]]
Through much of the important history of [[agriculture]], threshing was time-consuming and usually laborious, with a [[bushel]] of wheat taking about an hour.<ref>{{cite book |title=A New Economic View of American History |last1=Atack |first1=Jeremy |last2=Passell |first2=Peter |year=1994 |publisher=W.W. Norton and Co. |location=New York |isbn=0-393-96315-2 |pages=[https://archive.org/details detailing /neweconomicviewo00atac/page/282 282–3] |url=https://archive.org/details/neweconomicviewo00atac/page/282 }}</ref> In the late 18th century, before threshing was mechanized,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://texasarchive.org/2012_03004|title=The Bob & Diane Miller Collection - Wheat Threshing (1993)|website=Texas Archive of the Moving Image|access-date=November 19, 2019}}</ref> about one-quarter of agricultural labor was devoted to it.<ref>{{cite book |title=A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World |last=Clark |first=Gregory |year=2007 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-12135-2 |page=[https://archive.org/details/farewelltoalmsbr00clar/page/286 286] |url=https://archive.org/details/farewelltoalmsbr00clar/page/286 }}</ref>

It is likely that in the earliest days of agriculture the little grain that was raised was shelled by hand, but as the quantity increased the grain was probably beaten out with a stick, or the sheaf beaten upon the ground. An improvement on this, as the quantity further increased, was the practice of the [[ancient Egypt]]ians of spreading out the loosened sheaves on a circular enclosure of hard ground, and driving [[ox]]en, [[sheep]] or other animals round and round over it so as to tread out the grain. This enclosure was placed on an elevated piece of ground so that when the straw was removed the wind blew away the [[chaff]] and left the corn.{{sfn|McConnell|1911|p=887}} A contemporary version of this in some locations is to spread the grain on the surface of a country road so the grain may be threshed by the wheels of passing vehicles.<ref>M. Partridge, ''Farm Tools through the Ages'' (1973)</ref>

This method, however, damaged part of the grain, and it was partially superseded by the [[threshing sledge]], a heavy frame mounted with three or more rollers, sometimes spiked, which revolved as it was drawn over the spread out corn by two oxen. A common sledge with a ridged or grooved bottom was also used. Similar methods to these were used by the [[Ancient Greece|ancient Greeks]], and continued to be employed in the modern period in some places. In [[Italy]] the use of a tapering roller fastened to an upright shaft in the centre of the thrashing floor and pulled round from the outer end by oxen seems to be a descendant of the Roman {{lang|la|tribulum}} or roller sledge.{{sfn|McConnell|1911|p=887}}

[[File:La battage du blé à l'ancienne (Maison rurale de l'outre-forêt, Kutzenhausen).webm|thumb|Threshing wheat with a flail. A demonstration in [[slow motion]].]]
The [[Flail (tool)|flail]], a pair of connected sticks used to beat the grain, evolved from the early method of using a single stick. It, with the earlier methods, was described by [[Pliny the Elder]] in his first-century CE ''[[Natural History (Pliny)|Natural History]]'': "The cereals are threshed in some places with the threshing board on the threshing floor; in others they are trampled by a train of horses, and in others they are beaten with flails".<ref>''«Messis ipsa alibi tribulis in area, alibi equarum gressibus exteritur, alibi perticis flagellatur»''|Gaius Plinius Secundus, [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Pliny_the_Elder/18*.html#lxxii ''Naturalis Historia'', Liber XVIII (naturae frugum), lxxii - 298]; [[Pliny the Elder]], Natural History, Book XVIII (Agriculture), lxxii - 298.</ref> It seems to have been the thrashing implement in general use in all Northern European countries, and was the chief means of thrashing grain as late as 1860. It was known in [[Japan]] very early, and was probably used in conjunction with the [[Stripper (agriculture)|stripper]], an implement fashioned very much like a large comb, with the teeth made of hard wood and pointing upwards. The straw after being reaped was brought to this and combed through by hand, the heads being drawn off and afterwards threshed on the threshing floor by the flail. Much more recently, just such an implement, known as a "heckle", has been used for combing the bolls or heads off [[flax]], or for straightening the fibre in the after-treatment.{{sfn|McConnell|1911|p=887}}

After the grain had been beaten out by the flail or ground out by other means the straw was carefully raked away and the corn and chaff collected to be separated by [[winnowing]] when there was a wind blowing. This consisted of tossing the mixture of corn and chaff into the air so that the wind carried away the chaff while the grain fell back on the threshing floor. The best grain fell nearest while the lightest grain was carried some distance before falling, thus an approximate grading of the grain was obtained. It was also performed when there was no wind by fanning while pouring the mixture from a vessel. Later, a fanning or winnowing mill was invented. Barns were constructed with large doors opening in the direction of the prevailing winds so that the wind could blow right through the barn and across the threshing floor for the purpose of winnowing the corn. The flail continued to be used for special purposes such as flower seeds, and also where the quantity grown was small enough to render it not worth while to use a threshing mill.

With regard to the amount of grain threshed in a day by the flail, a fair average quantity was 8 bushels of wheat, 30 bushels of oats, 16 bushels of barley, 20 bushels of beans, 8 bushels of rye and 20 bushels of buckwheat.