{{Short description|Horse-drawn plow}} {{about||the Cambodian politician|Kem Sokha}} {{Italic title}} [[File:Великорусская соха.jpg|thumb|right|Great Russian ''sokha'', illustration by Nikolay Karazin, 1899]] thumb|''Sokha'' dating to the 19th to mid-20th century
A '''''sokha''''' ({{langx|ru|соха}}) is a light wooden ard, consisting of two body ards, with their parallel beams forming the two shafts for a single horse-drawn tillage implement with two socket shares ({{lang|ru|рассоха}}).<ref>H. J. Hopfen, ''Farm Implements for Arid and Tropical Regions'', 54.</ref> In later types, the double body is combined into one wooden board.
The ''sokha'' adapts the body ard to a single-animal harness following the pattern of a shaft-drawn cart and adds a spade-like component that turned over the soil. On ploughs, the curved mouldboard both cuts and turns the soil. Other design features can vary depending on local building custom.
It was used primarily in Russia,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hellie |first1=Richard |editor1-last=Mokyr |editor1-first=Joel |title=The Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History |date=2003 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-510507-0 |page=415 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Oxford_Encyclopedia_of_Economic_Hist/ssNMAgAAQBAJ |language=en |chapter=Russia: Early Modern Period}}</ref> Finland, and other countries in Northern and Eastern Europe.
==History== The origin of the ''sokha'' is uncertain, as well as its spread across the East European Plain.{{sfn|Smith|1977|p=17}} The current evidence suggests that it originated in the forest zone of European Russia.{{sfn|Smith|1977|p=20|loc="The present state of the evidence, then, suggests that the sokha developed in the forest zone of European Russia, though not necessarily in the coniferous part of that zone"}} The ''sokha'' is mentioned as a tool or tax unit in 1275 and two birch bark manuscripts found in Novgorod also reference the ''sokha'' around this time.{{sfn|Smith|1977|p=18}} In Russia, the ''sokha'' was also used as a unit of taxation and the size of the ''sokha'' varied greatly by region and over time as this depended on the quality of the land to be ploughed.{{sfn|Feldbrugge|2017|p=816,1055}}
By the 14th century, the ''sokha'' had spread to other regions, and its distribution is generally agreed to cover eastern Poland, northwestern Ukraine, Belarus, European Russia, Finland, and the Baltic states, as well as a small part of Siberia and Sweden.{{sfn|Smith|1977|p=19}} It likely spread first into the northern areas of the forest zone in European Russia and then Karelia, and then across the Gulf of Finland.{{sfn|Smith|1977|p=20}}
==See also== {{commonscat|Sokha}} * Timeline of Russian inventions and technology records
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Bibliography== * {{cite book |last1=Feldbrugge |first1=Ferdinand J. M. |title=A History of Russian Law: From Ancient Times to the Council Code (Ulozhenie) of Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich of 1649 |date=2 October 2017 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-35214-8 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_History_of_Russian_Law/TDI9DwAAQBAJ |language=en}} * {{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=Robert E. F. |title=Peasant Farming in Muscovy |date=1977 |publisher=CUP Archive |isbn=978-0-521-20912-0 |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Peasant_Farming_in_Muscovy/4So9AAAAIAAJ |language=en}} * George Vernadsky. ''A History of Russia''. (Yale University Press, 1969) ({{ISBN|0-300-00247-5}}).
Category:Agricultural machinery Category:Animal equipment Category:Gardening tools Category:Science and technology in Russia Category:Russian inventions Category:Ploughs