Tools Society

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Basic agricultural tools in a Czech medieval village included Henry’s trusty shovel (spade), and then adzes, hoes, spades, shears, knives, axes, flails, scythes, rakes, forks and also ploughing tools such as the beamed plough, turn-plough, ard-plough and harrow. Each craft had need of its own special equipment and tools.
Later, agricultural instruments played, among other things, a decisive role in the hands of skilled farmers during the Hussite wars, when, with minor improvements, they proved surprisingly useful not only for threshing grain, but also enemy knights (Catholics).
The versatility of the tools and also the ingenuity of the medieval people is evidenced by a preserved poem from the Jihlava (Iglau) region on the border of Bohemia and Moravia:
Jihlava maidens are quite fine folks,
they curl their hair with manure forks.

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