538 



ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1D37 



Egyptian plows there appears to be a tendency to develop a slade or 

 sole — a feature apparently already known in the Aegean area; possibly 

 its appearance in Egypt was connected in some way with those raids 

 by the "Sea Peoples" then going on. Something which has very much 

 the look of a coulter (not necessarily of metal) also appears in a few 

 representations of plows on New Kingdom monuments, and at least 

 one surviving examjile has actually been reported. ^^ 



Instances of the use of human instead of animal traction in plowing 

 are rare. An Eighteenth Dynasty relief (fig. 6) shows a plow of the 

 usual type drawn by four youths and guided by an older man who is 

 closely followed by a sower.-^ The form of the plow here is wrongly 

 reproduced by Lcpsius ^ and by those who have copied him. 



We know little as yet regarding the first appearance of the traction- 

 plow in Asia Minor. As we have seen, the eastern portion of that 

 area was perhaps not far removed from the original center of diffusion. 



Figure 5.— Plowing scene on lute Cassite setil-iuiprcssiou. (From University of Ponusylvauia Museum 



Jourmjl, vol. 1, p. 4, 1910.) 



A high degree of civilization existed in the region west of the Taurus 

 by the third millennium before our era,^° when the plow was already 

 known in Egypt and Cyprus. That it was used in Asia Minor as early 

 as it was in the latter of these two regions at least, we may regard as 

 certain. The peninsula became indeed in the course of time a second- 

 ary area of diffusion. For more detailed information we shall have 

 to await further archeological research. 



It was perhaps from Asia Minor that the traction plow reached 

 Crete. For the form used there during Minoan times, as it is depicted 

 in the hieroglypliic script, shows no resemblance to those ordinarily 

 used either in Mesopotamia or in Egypt. Unlike these, it has but a 



" Cf. Burkitt, M. C, Our early ancestors, p. 54, note 1, 1920. On the other hand. Dr. E. A. Speiser in- 

 forms me that the mention of "coulters" in I Sam. 12:20 and 21, is an anachronism due to a mistranslation. 



w Tylor, J. J., and Orifflth, F. LI., The Tomb of Paberi at El Kab, vol. 1, p. 13 and pi. 3, Egypt Explor. 

 Fund, Eleventh Mem., London, 1894. 



'• Lepsius, Richard, Denkmaler aus Aegyptien und Aethiopien, vol. 3, pi. 10-a. 



»o Smith, Sidney, History of Assyria to 1000 B. O., pp. 164 ff., 1928. 



