In Novoostara Ryurik learned some information further south. It was said that the Lovady River leading to Smolensk ran straight south. The Ostarans conducted some exploration, except for hunting.
Nothing new was discovered except for some squirrels and otters.
Men were responsible for pioneering, but their hometown in Northern Europe were all professional farmers. Their exploration did not extend too far, and no merchants from the south were found.
The forest is quiet, and the presence of birds and animals accentuates the silence here. It seems that a large area to the south is no man's land.
"It seems that this is the southern border of the Principality, and some defensive measures should be taken to prevent unexpected events."
Rurik felt that his speculation was correct. Since the waterway can extend all the way to Smolensk, it would be best for the other party to maintain peace. If there is hostility, the other party can flow down the river, then New Ostara will be very
Sadly, it has once again become a battlefield.
Such speculation shocked Carlotta. She once again thought of the horror of being dominated by the tragedy of corpses in her hometown. As for how to deal with the crisis, she naturally needed the military protection of the Prince of Rus. In addition, the city of New Ostara must also be fortressed.
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Rurik was very happy that the cattle and sheep here had the potential to thrive, but his hope of drinking milk and eating cheese was in vain.
The fleet circled around Lake Ilmen, and all the surrendered farms were inspected by the prince.
Rurik made a very important harvest. He saw those farmlands with his own eyes and compared the wheat growth in different farms. It was obvious that Novgorod and Mstisk used drill technology completely. The layout of wheat was very unique.
The effect of earing at the same time is also better.
The drilling technology of seeds not only brings the ultimate year-on-year high yield, but also saves labor during the harvest period.
The wheat harvest season is finally around the corner!
Rurik's fleet had just returned to Mstisk when a light rain came unexpectedly.
This rain came untimely, as if the gods were playing a joke on people. The climate in Eastern Europe is always like this. Summer rainfall is always accompanied by severe cooling, especially the rain in August. Even the drizzle makes people feel full.
Autumn mood.
Fortunately, this is just rainfall caused by fluctuations in the airflow. If there is an arctic cold current going south crazily, it will cause severe frost disasters and almost destroy this year's autumn harvest. The erosion of cold currents often occurs in September, although there is a possibility of it appearing in August.
Not high. Once the crops mature, no one dares to go against God, and the autumn harvest will never be delayed until September.
The local Slavs are preparing long-handled scythes for the farm, and they are also assisted by a number of short-handled scythes.
The method of autumn harvest is like this. Facing the large fields of the farm, the entire farm's labor force, both men and women, assembles.
The men in their prime all operate long-handled scythes. They can be divided into multiple groups, and each group takes turns operating the scythes to achieve the effect of always harvesting. The scythes circle back and forth across the farmland in a semicircle. This process is very dangerous, and the wheat stalks are driven crazy.
If someone is standing in front of you, the man's swing of the scythe will cut off the lower leg of the person in front of you.
The chopped wheat stalks and the drooping ears of oats were pushed to both sides by the scythe. Women and children held hemp ropes and straw ropes followed closely, bundling the loose wheat stalks and throwing them onto the two-wheeled cart, or directly
Directly resist walking.
Some flat land will be pounded in advance, and stones and wooden piles will be pounded into the hard ground that is rare in the local area to serve as a threshing ground.
Bundles of wheat straw were unloaded here and were pounded continuously by men holding wooden flails.
Farms that have the conditions will also perform pre-processing, that is, the guillotine will cut off the wheat ears of the bundles of wheat straw, and the flail will only beat the densely gathered wheat ears.
Because every grain of European oats is densely wrapped in bran, breaking out the grains is a manual job and requires a large number of farm laborers.
Although oats have their harvest and processing disadvantages, local people have no choice in their long-term lives. People on the shores of Lake Ilmen traditionally only grow oats, with rye as an auxiliary.
The people of Novgorod City are also preparing for the extremely traditional autumn harvest. They do not have more advanced wheat harvesting tools, and Rurik currently has no intention of building any more harvesting machinery. Wheat harvesting is still labor-intensive work.
, at this time, the advantage of having more people is fully displayed.
After the rain comes a sunny day, and the pleasant sunset brings a great sense of security to the Russian immigrants. As the temperature rises, the wheat earing and yellowing process are greatly accelerated.
When the drooping ears of wheat become withered and yellow, they should be harvested with a sickle.
Even if it is the first time for immigrants from Ross proper to plant wheat on a large scale, everyone still knows how to judge the timing of wheat harvest.
They will personally break open the dense bran of oats and chew them to determine whether the grains are mature.
After waiting throughout the warm period, Rurik stood here with his army. All the conditions have been mature, and the oats sown first have reached the harvest season!
The total mobilizable labor force (including children) in Mstisk is as many as 4,000 people.
Rurik had no time to care about the wheat harvest in Novgorod, not far away. He focused on the work in the main grain-producing areas that he could firmly control, especially on the wealth of his own acres.
The wheat is also heading, and the ears are still dark green. Their appearance makes the people quite curious, which is naturally not uncommon for Rurik. On the contrary, looking around, there are oats everywhere, which makes Rurik curious.
I was surprised, but also regretful that the fields were planted with low-yielding oats.
In Rurik's concept, the evolution of wheat ears from dark green to withered yellow is a very rapid process. Maybe after the early oats are harvested, the wheat can also be harvested.
Nothing is more important now than the wheat harvest.
It was a clear morning. The sunshine in early August was still warm. The morning fog that filled the entire lake gradually dissipated. People who had been ordered to assemble were standing on the flat ground outside Mstisk city on the dock facing the lake. Here are reserved
The comprehensive unloading yard for ship supplies is now the most ideal gathering place for personnel.
In front of 4,000 men, women and children, Rurik rolled up cardboard into the shape of a trumpet, stood on a tilted trolley, and held up the paper trumpet to preach to his tribe.
"Our immigration work is over! You are all the Russians who have immigrated to the Novgorod region! The land under your feet was conquered by you with the sword and ax of Russia. You sowed the seeds, and now the wheat is ripe! Odin
Bless us, now we are harvesting wheat, and it will be completed successfully in two weeks!"
He repeated similar words, and at first there were scattered people cheering, but gradually it turned into a roaring crowd.
Look at these people! Among them, the men carry scythes on their shoulders in large numbers. The Russians, who have huge iron resources, can use carbon steel tools unscrupulously. A number of comprehensive scythes made in their homeland now have
A perfect place to use it.
Strictly speaking, oats, wheat and rye are all derived from miscanthus grasses similar to foxtail grass. Their essence is grass. The so-called autumn harvest crops and the collection of forage for livestock work in much the same way.
Throughout Europe, scythes are used to harvest crops. This is directly related to the agricultural technology radiation of the Roman Empire a long time ago. Many barbarians converted from fishing and hunting to farming, and they were the first to learn Roman agriculture. They were Slavs who lived in the northern border area of Rome.
, even if they immigrated to the distant Lake Ilmen, they could not lose the Roman skills they learned. And several large Germanic tribes such as the Franks who had long been mercenaries for the Roman Empire, the expansion of the Franks also spread agricultural technology to the north.
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Even though Roman agriculture was not very sophisticated and was constantly lost in the process of spreading northward, the two crafts of harvesting wheat with scythes and beating the hulls with flails can be said to have been inherited by the three ethnic groups in the north, the Germanic, Slavic, and Baltic.
There are more than a hundred scythes here in Mstisk. At critical moments, they also made magical modifications to their own steel sabers, because the hilts are mostly made of wooden blocks sandwiching a core of iron sheets with hemp rope and tendon loops.
The sword was wrapped in a circle, the hilt was dismantled, and the sword was tied horizontally to a wooden pole, and a simple scythe was born.
The warriors of the First Flag Team have already begun to separate. They are running towards their fields with their wives and children. The men control the scythe to cut the wheat as if killing the enemy, and it feels so good to cut off everything. The women and children are busy gathering the wheat, and no one dares
Get more rest. This is a major issue related to your livelihood throughout the next year. Even if you are so tired that you almost cough up blood, you must continue to fight.
Rurik was holding a long-handled wooden flail, and the top of the object was a three-section stick tied with a rope. Relying on the whipping effect, he swung the flail and struck it hard on the oat stalks piled into hills.
The prince was showing off to his people. He was putting on a show, but not entirely, because the pile of oats legally belonged to his cousin's property. He was a prince at that time, but now he is more willing to help as a younger brother.
My cousin does farm work.
He was sweating profusely and had to use great force during the beating. The accumulated fatigue had made him have no intention of speaking. He just repeated the beating action and endured the fatigue of his arms until night.
The moon rose, and Rurik, who was sweating profusely, sat quietly in a bonfire. He was accompanied by a group of old guys, all of whom were young men under his command. They had been busy for the first day, and now they were resting.
No one is speechless.
Everyone was sweating a lot, and the old clothes had just been given to the women for cleaning, and were being placed in sheets by the campfire to bake. Everyone put on spare clothes, and everyone felt like they had sweated out a lifetime in just one day because of their weakness.
All.
Fisk felt chilled all over, and his three wives and concubines sat beside him to warm themselves by the fire, feeling the same chill.
"Rurik..." Or was he the first to start the conversation, "We will help them harvest wheat, and when we reach our Youth City... they will also help?"
"Hey, we are all Russians, you are actually worried about this? As long as I give an order, the soldiers must obey."
Arik saw the work of Ross's young boys and followed his brother's words and promised: "Fisk, you can rest assured that I will not only help you, but also help you build the city."
"Oh! That's great. Thank you so much..."
"No need to thank you! Boy, your father and my father fought side by side and died for Ross in the same battle. You are now the flag captain of the Sixth Flag Team and will have a bright future in the future. I am also your brother, so I should help you.
"
But how could Fisker Hod and Arik be brothers? But the other person's words were very heart-warming and more comforting than the flames.
The iron pot and pottery urn are cooking freshly beaten oats. Some yellow root carrots and locally collected fresh oats are added to the cooked oatmeal to increase nutrition, and then a large amount of salt is poured in crazily.
The way for the Principality of Rus to obtain salt has never been to rely on the supply of the Balmoks in the Port of Narvik facing the Atlantic Ocean. The Balmoks provide the best salt, and the cost of purchasing these salts is not high, except for the time cost of logistics.
Ridiculously high.
No matter how low the salt content of the seawater in the Gulf of Finland is, it is still seawater. Even if it costs more for firewood, New Rossburg has been doing the work of fetching seawater to boil salt locally. Fortunately, there are inexhaustible local wood resources.
Salt is just a way to add more firewood.
In this Novgorod region, no one eats salt more unscrupulously than the Russians.
People who were forced to rest at night achieved great results on the first day of the autumn harvest. Everyone did not want to talk much because of exhaustion. After the hot salty wheat porridge was cooked and everyone regained their strength after a delicious meal, they went to the bonfire to talk about the mountains.
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The men boasted about how many acres of wheat they had harvested this year and estimated their wheat wealth. They showed off their strong arms and boasted that one person could harvest several hectares of wheat without knowing what it meant to be tired.
After they finished bragging about their strength, they started talking about women.
Wherever there are people, there is always comparison. They show off their wives and concubines, and brag that they can give birth to more children than they can count on both hands. As soon as they started talking, some people began to tease their princes. The so-called more than ten wives and concubines can give birth to a total of 100 children.
One hundred children? They did not doubt Prince Rurik's ability. First of all, the "April Bull" was tireless, not to mention that he was the son of God, and of course he was different from mortals.
Rurik laughed off the comments he heard about himself.
They can talk about desperately trying to have children with their wives, which makes him happy. After all, the Russian people have changed. When each man has a lot of wheat, a couple bids farewell to the past living conditions. They don’t have to
Furthermore, because of the limited resources, selective cultivation of offspring has given them the capital to reproduce unscrupulously. Furthermore, this autumn harvest very realistically shows the fact that the population determines the efficiency of the autumn harvest.
If you encounter rainy weather, you must rush to harvest wheat. The weather now is rarely good, but everyone is completely immersed in the joy of the harvest. In line with the good habit of the Russians to store wealth, every household is eager to put away their own crops in two or three days.
The acres of land were harvested cleanly, and finally they were stuffed into the family granary and one-tenth of the harvest was used to pay taxes to the prince.
The strong Russian men are generally a head taller and stronger than the traditional Slavic farmers in the region, which is reflected in their greater efficiency in wheat harvesting.
The first sown oats were harvested in just three days. All the wheat grains were shelled, shoveled into coarse sacks with wooden shovels, and packed into the home in packages.
As early as six years ago, the Russians began to improve their homes. Rurik played a huge role in this regard. He made some improvements to the traditional Slavic wood carvings and added closet facilities to enhance winter heating.
The wooden floor that is higher than the ground avoids moisture to a great extent. This kind of wood carving can be directly used as a granary. Of course, we will also face the problem of mice, which is completely a minor problem.
In this era, the Russians even regarded rats as a kind of food. Rats, squirrels and mink were both a kind of meat, but the leather of rats was useless. In the past, under difficult circumstances, the people of Russia naturally ate whatever they could, and rotten fish meat was also eaten.
Just eat it and no one will care if it causes diarrhea or other diseases.
The rodent problem that cannot be eliminated by primitive storage technology is a problem, but Rurik has not bothered to eliminate the problems of moisture, rodents and other food losses. He needs the people to quickly stuff the harvested wheat into their homes, and then continue to sweep
The remaining fields.
People have to harvest the remaining wheat for the Prince of Rus, and all the Prince provides is free food during the harvest period.
The men have no complaints, because everyone knows how the prince has used wheat in the past few years. It seems that everyone is harvesting wheat for the prince, which is indeed the case, but in the end the benefits are also the general public. The prince still owns an astonishing area of acres.
, now the wheat here has reached the point where it is withered and yellow and can be harvested. The prince's promise remains unchanged. A batch of wheat will be sold to the public every month. Its price will be constant no matter in bad years or good years. Everyone can buy it every month.
After getting a batch of wheat, you can make delicious soft and glutinous scones at home, which is something you can't do with oatmeal.
The Principality of Rus implements a de facto grain-based policy. The prince prohibits bank runs, and also stipulates the amount and price of wheat sold every month in the form of laws. The purchasing power of each silver coin is fixed, which is ten pounds of oats and rye.
Or nine pounds of wheat. The price of salt is also anchored by wheat.
To ensure the economic stability of the Rus' Principality, it is necessary to ensure that a large amount of wheat is stuffed into the prince's "national granary" located in Novgorod, Novorosberg and Russburg's hometown.
The people's ideological consciousness is not that high, and their vision is not very long-term.
They are more aware of the fact that when a prince calls an army to fight, theoretically every soldier does not have to bring his own dry food. The food for the army is paid by the national granary.
Now the wheat has matured. It is completely different from the drooping ears of oats. The ears of wheat are straight upward like spearheads, and the density of wheat grains is obviously higher than that of oats. Of course, the ears of wheat here are not so dense that it is impossible to stand. Without chemical fertilizers, even farmers can
The yield of a wheat field without fertilizers will never be high. Even so, it is visibly better than that of oats. The most striking feature is naturally the wheat ear. There can be as many as twenty grains growing on one ear. Everyone has to
I admire a British cold-resistant wheat species that is naturally high-yielding!
The men lined up like a battle formation, swung their scythes across the fields, and cut down the wheat stalks in pieces. This was the first time that wheat was planted on a large scale in Novgorod. The experimental planting had a huge impact visible to the naked eye.
As a result, Rurik made a firm decision - to plant wheat on a large scale in the spring of next year, so that Novgorod, Mstisk and Youth City can make wheat farming their business.