Winnowing

Wind winnowing is an agricultural method developed by ancient cultures for separating grain from chaff. It is also used to remove weevils or other pests from stored grain. Threshing, the separation of grain or seeds from the husks and straw, is the step in the chaff-removal process that comes before winnowing.

In its simplest form it involves throwing the mixture into the air so that the wind blows away the lighter chaff, while the heavier grains fall back down for recovery. Techniques included using a winnowing fan (a shaped basket shaken to raise the chaff) or using a tool (a winnowing fork or shovel) on a pile of harvested grain.

In China

In Ancient China the method was improved by mechanisation with the development of the rotary winnowing fan, which used a cranked fan to produce the airstream. [ [http://www2.tu-berlin.de/~china/deutsch/abstracts/Vogel.html The Question of the Transmission of the Rotary Winnowing Fan from China to Europe: Some New Findings] , Hans Ulrich Vogel, 8th International Conference on the History of Science in China] This was featured in Wang Zhen's book the "Nong Shu" of 1313 AD. This technique was not adopted in Europe until the 1700s, when winnowing machines used a 'sail fan'. [ [http://www.antiquefarmtools.info/page3.htm Broadcasting and winnowing] , Antique Farm Tools]

In Greek culture

The winnowing-fan ("liknon") featured in the rites accorded Dionysus and in the Eleusinian Mysteries: "it was a simple agricultural implement taken over and mysticised by the religion of Dionysus," Jane Ellen Harrison remarked. [Harrison, "Prolegomean to the Study of Greek Religion", 3rd ed. (1922:159).] "Dionysus Liknites" ("Dionysus of the winnowing fan") was wakened by the Dionysian women, in this instance called "Thyiades", in a cave on Parnassus high above Delphi; the winnowing-fan links the god connected with the mystery religions to the agricultural cycle, but mortal Greek babies too were laid in a winnowing-fan. [Karl Kerenyi, "Dionysus: Archetypal Image of Indestructible Life" (1976:44).] . In Callimachus' "Hymn to Zeus", Adrasteia lays the infant Zeus in a golden "liknon"; [The translation "cradle" loses the image.] her goat suckles him and he is given honey.

In the Odyssey, the dead oracle Teiresias tells Odysseus to walk away from Ithaca with an oar until a wayfarer tells him it is a winnowing fan, and there to build a shrine to Poseidon.

In the New Testament

In the Gospel according to Matthew 3.12, a sentence introduces the separation of wheat and chaff (good and bad) by "His winnowing fan is in his hand" (American Standard Bible translation).

In the United States

The development of the winnowing barn allowed rice plantations in South Carolina to increase their yields dramatically.

ee also

*Chaffing and winnowing
*Threshing
*Winnowing Oar

References