The emergence and development of farm tools and agriculture are synchronous and promote each other. In the primitive agricultural period, agricultural production was relatively extensive, and the materials of farm tools were mainly stones, bones, mussels and wood. Species can be divided into three categories: cultivation, harvesting and processing. Farming generally includes shovels, hoes and hoes; Harvesting includes knives, sickles, etc. The most common processing types are stone mill and stone mill bar. In addition, there are farm tools made of antlers. Pottery has been invented and applied for a long time, mainly used for drawing water, storing things and cooking food. Since then, the development of farm tools in various periods is roughly as follows.
Xia, Shang and Western Zhou Dynasties
Agriculture improved during this period, but the main materials used were wood, stones and bones. At that time, bronze was produced, but it was mostly used for weapons, food containers and ritual vessels. By the end of the Western Zhou Dynasty, only some farm tools and harvesting tools were made of bronze. In addition, there is a wooden hammer with a long wooden handle, which is used to break the soil and compact the ridge. Pumping and irrigation equipment, which is very important in agriculture, existed in Shang Dynasty. Buckets and buckets in the Western Zhou Dynasty were used to get water from ponds and wells for irrigation. Although the variety of farm tools in this period did not increase much and the efficiency was not high, it laid the foundation for the development of iron farm tools later.
the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period
The rise of iron smelting industry has brought a great change in the history of agricultural tools in China: iron tools have replaced wood and stone tools, which has made a qualitative leap in agricultural productivity. The vast majority of farm tools in the Warring States period were made of wood with iron blades, that is, an iron blade was put on the wood, which greatly improved the production efficiency compared with the past wood and stone farm tools. From the archaeological unearthed objects, the use of V-shaped iron plow head at that time was beneficial to reduce the resistance when plowing; Iron samarium can increase the excavation depth; Spades can be effectively used for weeding, loosening soil, restoring soil and nourishing soil. In addition, an effective threshing farm tool popular in this period has been used by later generations for a long time.
Qin and Han Dynasties to Sui and Tang Dynasties
After the Qin Dynasty unified China, especially since the Han Dynasty, due to the great development of iron smelting industry, not only iron farm tools became more popular, but also with the development of agricultural production, the types of farm tools increased and the quality was greatly improved. After the mid-Western Han Dynasty, the wooden core and iron blade farm tools have been replaced by all-iron farm tools. With the popularization of Niu Geng, the plough has also been innovated. Besides all iron, it has also created a plough wall, which is more conducive to deep ploughing and breaking soil. The giant ploughshare used for ditching in the Eastern Han Dynasty weighed 15 kg and was about 40 cm long. The structure of Qu Yuan's plough recorded in Lei Geng Jing in Tang Dynasty is more complex and complete, and it is composed of 1 1 parts. It has been able to carry out deep ploughing and shallow ploughing as required, adjust the width of cultivated land, and it is convenient to operate. Since the Han Dynasty, agricultural tools such as hoes for grinding and leveling soil, hoes and shovels for intertillage, crochets for harvesting and so on have appeared, and have been gradually improved. Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties have gained new achievements, such as breaking ground to conserve moisture and leveling the land. Another farm tool was invented at this time. The axle is composed of a stone frame and a wooden frame, which is a soil compactor. In the Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties, it developed into a thorn in the wheel.
In this period, the emergence of seeder is a great progress to improve agricultural production efficiency. There are three hoes at the lower end of the plow, namely three ditchers, and a funnel for storing seeds is installed in the middle. When sowing, the ox cart pulls and sows while ditching, which is both fast and good. The creation and improvement of irrigation equipment is also of great significance. In the past, Torreya grandis mainly used levers, which was not only laborious, but also inconvenient for deep well pumping and large-scale irrigation. The pulley or pulley created in the Han Dynasty greatly improved the efficiency of pumping water. Rollover (i.e. keel waterwheel) was first used for pond irrigation in Gong Yuan at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, and then it was gradually popularized among the people. After the continuous innovation in the late Eastern Han Dynasty and the Three Kingdoms Wei Dynasty, it can be called a great creation of irrigation tools. It uses gears to drive many wipers on the chain to scrape water into the car slot, which is driven by human or animal power. When it is used for water pumping and irrigation, its efficiency is far superior to the previous irrigation equipment. At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the earliest siphon appeared. The vertical waterwheel invented in the Tang, Song and Five Dynasties is mainly used to take water from deep wells, and also uses the gear principle. As for the high turnover vehicle, it is a device connected by many bamboo tubes, which pumps water into the tubes and lifts it to a high place with the help of hydraulic shafts, mainly used in the Yangtze River basin. In addition, in the processing of agricultural products, such as the use of windmills, the progress of rice threshing tools from Chu Jiu to pedal cymbals to hydraulic cymbals, especially the continuous grinding with multiple gears rotating together, the efficiency has been greatly improved.
Song and Yuan Dynasties
During this period, the development of farm tools in China surpassed the previous generation in power utilization, machine improvement, variety increase and application scope. There are only more than 30 kinds of farm tools recorded in the Book of Qi Yaomin in the Northern Wei Dynasty. However, as many as 105 kinds of farm tools were included in the Farm Tools Atlas in Wang Zhennong's Book in Yuan Dynasty, which almost included all the farm tools and was beautifully illustrated. At this time, lassos and hooks also appeared. The noose divides "a bar" into two ropes, which can increase Niu Geng's traction; Hook is to separate the power machine from the working machine. In this way, using lasso to serve cattle can greatly shorten the plow body and make it easy to rotate, so Niu Geng can be used not only peacefully in paddy fields, but also in hilly and mountainous areas. During this period, there was an improved plow attached to the plow bed or plow shaft, which could remove reed weeds and facilitate farming. In paddy field production, there are shovels and intertillage farm tools. Tai is a soil compactor, which can be used with tractors to compact the soil after sowing. The invention of seedling horse in Song Dynasty can reduce the labor intensity of pulling out seedlings in rice field production. During this period, there also appeared high-efficiency combined farm tools, such as wheat cages for sowing and fertilizing, harvesting, farm tools consisting of wheat husks and straws, hoes that can be cultivated for 20 A Mu days, and multi-purpose waterwheels. In addition to human and animal power, agricultural power also uses wind and water for irrigation, drainage and agricultural products processing. The S-shaped hook, which appeared in the Jin Dynasty, has been widely used in the Central Plains. It improves the connection device between the power of farm tools and the working machine, doubles its own tension, improves the connection between farm tools such as plows, plows, harrows, plows and hoes, and power mechanisms such as animal power, water power and wind power and the working machine in various agricultural processes, and improves the efficiency.
Ming and Qing dynasties
Compared with Yuan Dynasty, farm tools in Ming and Qing Dynasties changed little and developed slowly, but some farmers improved. For example, at the end of the Ming Dynasty, there was a pulling rope instead of a ploughing frame, and the plough was pulled by a winch, so that farming could be done "sitting hard and moving freely". During this period, exposed hoes appeared in the north of China, and hoes, insect combs, insecticidal pulleys and farm tools made of antlers appeared in the south. It reflects that the traditional agricultural intensive cultivation is getting higher and higher. In addition, at the same time, due to the development of iron and steel smelting and casting technology, great progress has been made in the creation and improvement of farm tool parts.