Page 56 - Arabian Studies (I)

42 Arabian Studies /

rain, and ploughed over so that it becomes covered by earth. The
sowing by hand-scatter79 should be middling in such a way that
seven grains drop on the space of a single foot-step or what more or
less approximates to that. Over good ground sowing by hand-scatter
is less dense because the crop [standing] on it would be crowded
together, be overmuch, and spoil itself; while poor or middling good
land should have a middling hand-scatter [ofseed], without it being
[too] thin. Scatter-sowing means that it [the seed] is tossed by
hand - one takes a handful of wheat and tosses it in front of, and
about oneself, after marking out a marker for it with which to
distinguish the place [already] scatter-sown from the place which
one has not [yet] scatter-sown, lest the scatter-sowing of the seed
over it be repeated, or some remain unsown. It is [then] ploughed
over, and any scrub, grass, roots or the like on the ground are
cleared, nor should one leave the ground until it is cleared of any
weeds on it. If however, it is land which is watered by running
streams, the ground, after scatter-sowing, is divided up into sections
like troughs. This division is made through its (the land) being
ploughed with the ploughing implement, one even furrow, alongside
which one ploughs an additional furrow in such a way that a side of
the (second) furrow stands up [so as to form a bank along with the
side of the first furrow] - beyond this is left a piece [of ground] [of
a size] conforming with the known force, or lack of force, of the
running stream employed for irrigation,80 and one ploughs [yet]
another furrow with a second furrow beside it, so that a side of it
stands up. One continues in this way until the ground is divided up
into troughs/plots so that each plot may be watered separately with
the water of the running stream and it may cover all the ground, plot
by plot.’
Green grain for parching (farik)81 begins first to be taken from it
after three months. He said, in al-Ishdrah: ‘It [farik] stands in the
same place as jahlsh with the folk of the Tihamas with regard to
millet’ - and (it begins to be taken) from WasnT/WisnT after eighty
days. When one wants to make parched grain of it, let him cut from
half-way up the stalk when the crop has just begun to turn yellow
and the ear has filled. It is bound into sheaves, each sheaf what the
hand can grasp, and one lights a fire with a flame but no smoke, and
burns off the hairs [awn] of the ear in it until they are burnt up and
the grain in its ear is cooked. It is rubbed with the hand on a
palm-leaf basket-work tray, or beaten with a stick in a goat-wool
bag,82 then winnowed. If only partially cooked it is toasted lightly
in a piece of pot-sherd, an open-necked jar or a frying pan, without
too strong a fire on it so that it dries up.