ABSTRACT
During the centuries which immediately followed their settlement in Canaan, flocks and herds had been the chief dependence of the Hebrews, for they took to agriculture but slowly. Wheat and barley, the olive and the grape, they learned to cultivate, but there is nothing to show that there was any great variety of agricultural staples. It is different during the period we are now considering. Life becomes distinctively agricultural. 1 A great variety of products appears. They still have flocks and herds, but the main dependence is upon agriculture. Wheat and barley are the great staples; the olive and the grape are even more widely cultivated; but beans, lentils, and other products are mentioned. Wine was universally used, and strong drink, made probably of the juices of other fruit than the grape, for the fortification of wine was probably unknown, was produced. Familiar among the sights of rural life was the wine-press. The possession of one was even more a mark of distinction among them than the threshing-floor with its oxen and threshing-sledge. Primitive methods of agriculture prevailed. Implements were used, but were still of rude construction. The mention of the yoke, the plough, the ox-goad, the cart and the wagon, the harness, the harrow, the mattock, the axe, the sickle, the basket, etc., but partially suggests a type of life in which work was done very largely by hand, thus necessitating the employment of all, old and young, at certain seasons, as in the earlier time.
