TechnologyThe Middle East
The ard and draught animals
Oxen make what one family can farm five times larger
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The plough also changed who did what. Hoe cultivation was often women's work; guiding oxen demanded bodily strength and became men's work, and land ownership followed. The connection is well documented: societies with a long plough tradition still show lower female labour participation today than neighbours who used the hoe.
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As long as the soil had to be turned with a hoe, a family could work only a small patch. With an ard drawn by oxen, the same people could plough many times as much. The surplus made cities possible.
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Part of Terra Saga — the story of Earth on a timeline. terrasaga.org