Editing Plough (section)

==Etymology==
In older English, as in other [[Germanic languages]], the plough was traditionally known by other names, e.g. [[Old English]] {{lang|ang|sulh}} (modern dialectal ''{{lang|en|sullow}}''), [[Old High German]] {{lang|goh|medela}}, {{lang|goh|geiza}}, {{lang|goh|huohilī(n)}}, [[Old Norse]] {{lang|non|arðr}} ([[Swedish language|Swedish]] {{lang|sv|årder}}), and [[Gothic language|Gothic]] {{lang|got|hōha}}, all presumably referring to the [[ard (plough)|ard]] (scratch plough).

The modern word comes from the [[Old Norse]] {{lang|non|plógr}}, and is therefore Germanic, but it appears relatively late (it is not attested in [[Gothic language|Gothic]]) and is thought to be a loan from one of the north [[Italic languages]]. The German cognate is "pflug", the Dutch "ploeg" and the Swedish "plog". In many Slavic languages and in Romanian the word is "plug". Words with the same root appeared with related meanings: in [[Raetic]] {{lang|xrr|plaumorati}} "wheeled heavy plough" ([[Pliny the Elder|Pliny]], ''[[Natural History (Pliny)|Nat. Hist.]]'' 18, 172), and in [[Latin language|Latin]] {{lang|la|plaustrum}} "farm cart", {{lang|la|plōstrum, plōstellum}} "cart", and {{lang|la|plōxenum, plōximum}} "cart box".<ref>C. T. Onions, ed., ''Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology'', s.v. "plough" (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996).</ref><ref>''Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language'', s.v. "plow" (NY: Gramercy Books, 1996).</ref> The word must have originally referred to the wheeled heavy plough, common in Roman north-western Europe by the 5th century AD.<ref>{{Cite web |first=Judith A. |last=Weller |title=Agricultural Use |website=Roman Traction Systems |access-date=20 April 2012 |url=http://www.humanist.de/rome/rts/agriculture.html |year=1999}}</ref>

Many view ''plough'' as a derivative of the verb *''plehan'' ~ *''plegan'' 'to take responsibility' (cf. German ''pflegen'' 'to look after, nurse'), which would explain, for example, Old High German ''pfluog'' with its double meaning of 'plough' and 'livelihood'.<ref>[[Jaan Puhvel]], "The Indo-European and Indo-Aryan plough: a linguistic study of technological diffusion", ''Technology and Culture'' 5, no. 2 (1964): 176–190.</ref><ref>[[Jan de Vries (philologist)|Jan de Vries]], ''Nederlands Etymologisch Woordenboek'', s.v. "ploeg" (Leiden: Brill, 1971).</ref><ref>Ruth Schmidt-Wiegand, 'Wörter und Sachen. Zur Bedeutung einer Methode für die Frühmittelalterforschung. Der Pflug und seine Bezeichnungen', in ''Wörter und Sachen im Lichte der Bezeichnungsforschung'' (Berlin: B.R.D.; NY: Walter de Gruyter, 1981), 1–41; Heinrich Beck, 'Zur Terminologie von Pflug und Pflügen – vornehmlich in den nordischen und kontinentalen germanischen Sprachen', in ''Untersuchungen zur eisenzeitlichen und frühmittelalterlichen Flur in Mitteleuropa und ihre Nutzung'', eds. Heinrich Beck et al. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1980), 2: 82–98.</ref> Guus Kroonen (2013)<ref>Guus Kroonen, ''Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic'', s.v. "*plōga-" (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 398.</ref> proposes a ''[[vṛddhi]]''-derivative of *''plag/kkōn'' 'sod' (cf. Dutch ''plag'' 'sod', Old Norse ''plagg'' 'cloth', Middle High German {{lang|gmh|pflacke}} 'rag, patch, stain'). Finally, Vladimir Orel (2003)<ref name=orel>[[Vladimir Orel]], ''A Handbook of Germanic Etymology'', s.v. "*plōȝuz" (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 292.</ref> tentatively attaches ''plough'' to a [[Proto-Indo-European language|PIE]] stem *''{{PIE|blōkó-}}'', which supposedly gave [[Old Armenian]] {{transliteration|hy|peɫem}} "to dig" and [[Welsh language|Welsh]] {{lang|cy|bwlch}} "crack", though the word may not be of Indo-European origin.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2014-01-22 |title=Góra Body (Hexentanzplatz – Góra Tańcujących Czarownic ) i Góra Bodo (Brocken) w Harzykowskich Górach (Harz) |url=https://bialczynski.pl/2014/01/22/gora-body-w-harzykowskich-gorach-hexentanzplatz-gora-tancujacych-czarownic-w-gorach-harz/ |access-date=2023-07-05 |website=Białczyński |language=pl-PL}}</ref>