Wellmann Imre szerk.: A Magyar Mezőgazdasági Múzeum Közleményei 1971-1972 (Budapest, 1973)

White, Kenneth D.: The Great Chesterford scythes

Pl. 3. Cross-section of back-strip and central portion of blade, showing central portion enclosed within backstrip III. Problems posed by these implements 1. Technical: the hafting. A blade of this design could not be fitted with the usual heel and straight handle displayed on Roman monuments.

4 J. W. Anstee experimented with a variety of hafting methods, all of which started with a foot-type heel, as shown in the finished copy now in the Museum of English Rural Life (see pl. 1). The scythe could be used with a straight handle, but with reduced efficiency, as against the full swing provided by a curved handle with grips. Whatever the final solution of this aspect of the problem, it can no longer be asserted with any confidence that these blades must have formed part of some kind of harvesting machine! A replica has been made and used on a variety of crops. 2. What sort of crops? This scythe has been successfully used on a lawn, a crop of tall dense grass, and on wheat. In Roman practice scythes were used for grass, never for corn. The only change we notice in methods of harvesting cereals was the invention of the animal-powered heading machine in northeastern Gaul.

5 I therefore assume that our Great Chesterford scythes were '*For illustrations of the straight-handled scythe see LEGALL, J. Les «falces» et la faux. Annales de l'Est XXII. 4: 1959, Et. d'arch. class, t. II, à la mém. de M. Lautnay. "'WHITE, K. D. Agricultural Implements of the Roman World. Cambridge 1967.157 ff. 6 81