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A sickle, bagging hook, reaping-hook or grasshook is a single-handed agricultural tool designed with variously curved and typically used for or reaping grain crops, or cutting Succulent plant forage chiefly for feeding livestock. Falx was a synonym, but was later used to mean any of a number of tools that had a curved blade that was sharp on the inside edge.
Since the beginning of the Iron Age hundreds of region-specific variants of the sickle have evolved, initially of iron and later steel. This great diversity of sickle types across many cultures can be divided into smooth or serrated blades, both of which can be used for cutting either green grass or mature cereals using slightly different techniques. The serrated blade that originated in prehistoric sickles still dominates in the reaping of grain and is even found in modern grain-harvesting machines and in some kitchen knives.
This intricate ‘tooth-like’ design showed a greater degree of design and manufacturing credence than most of the other artifacts that were discovered. Sickle blades found during this time were made of flint, straight and used in more of a sawing motion than with the more modern curved design. Flints from these sickles have been discovered near Mt. Carmel, which suggest the harvesting of grains from the area about 10,000 years ago.
The relatively narrow growing season in the area and the critical role of grain in the late Neolithic promoted a larger investment in the design and manufacture of sickle over other tools. Standardization to an extent was done on the measurements of the sickle so that replacement or repair could be more immediate. It was important that the grain be harvested at the appropriate time at one elevation so that the next elevation could be reaped at the proper time. The sickle provided a more efficient option in collecting the grain and significantly sped up the developments of early agriculture.
In archaeological terminology, Bronze Age sickles are classified by the method of attaching the handle. E.g. the knob-sickle (German Knopfsichel) is so called because of a protruding knob at the base of the blade which apparently served to stabilize the attachment of the blade to the handle.Christoph Sommerfeld: Gerätegeld Sichel. Studien zur monetären Struktur bronzezeitlicher Horte im nördlichen Mitteleuropa (Vorgeschichtliche Forschungen Bd. 19), Berlin/New York 1994 , p. 157.
Due to this passage, despite the fact that Pliny does not indicate the source on which he based this account, some branches of modern Druidry (Neodruids) have adopted the sickle as a ritual tool.
A similar site discovered sickles made from other material such as the Caddo Sickle, which was made from a deer mandible. Scripture from early natives document the use of these sickles in the cutting of grass. The instruments ranged from tip to haft. Several other digs in eastern Arizona uncovered wooden sickles that were shaped in a similar fashion. The handles of the tools help describe how the tool was held in such a way so that the inner portion that contained the cutting surface could also serve as a gathering surface for the grain. Sickles were sharpened by scraping a shape beveled edge with a coarse tool. This action has left marks on artifacts that have been found. The sharpening process was necessary to keep the cutting edge from being dulled after extended use. The edge is seen to be quite highly polished, which in part proves that the instrument was used to cut grass.
After collection, the grass was used as material to create matting and bedding. The sickle in general provided the convenience of cutting the grass as well as gathering in one step. In modern times, the sickle is being used in South America as tool to harvest rice. Rice clusters are harvested using the instrument and left to dry in the sun.
Hasiya have traditionally been made by local blacksmiths in their charcoal foundries that use leather bellows to blow air. Sharpening of the Hasiya is done by rubbing the edges against a smooth rock or taken back to the blacksmith. Sharpening of the Hasiya is generally done during the beginning of the harvesting season.
Bigger Hasiya is called Khurpa (or Khoorpa) where the curve is less pronounced, is much heavier and is used to sever branches of trees with leaves (for animal feed), chop meat etc. The famous Nepali Khukuri is also a type of sickle where the curve becomes least visible.
Carrying around a sharp and naked Hasiya or Khurpa is unsafe. So Nepalis have traditionally built a cover/holder for it called "Khurpeto" (meaning Khurpa holder in Nepali). It could be a simple piece of wood with a hole big enough to slide the blade of Hasiya inside or could be an intricately carved piece of round wood slung around one's waist with a string made of plants (called "hatteuri"). Nowadays though many use cotton, jute or even cloth strings as a replacement of hatteuri which is not easy to find.
England appears to have been the first to develop the industrial process of serration-making. Then, by 1897, the of Scharnstein, in Austria—at that time the largest scythe-maker in the world—designed its own machine for the job, becoming the only Austrian source of serrated sickles. In 1942, its recently acquired sister-company Krenhof also began to produce these. In 1970, a year before the sickle-production branch of Redtenbacher was sold to Ethiopia, they were still making 1.5 million of the serrated sickles per year, predominately for markets in Africa and Latin America. There were other enterprises in Austria, of course, which produced the smoothed-edged sickles for centuries. The last of the classical "round" versions were forged until the mid-1980s and machined until 2002.
While in Central Europe the smooth-edged sickle—either forged or machined (alternately referred to as "stamped") - has been the only one used (and in many regions the only one known), the Iberian Peninsula, Sicily and Greece long had fans of both camps. The many small family-owned enterprises in the areas of present-day Italy, Portugal and Spain produced sickles in both versions, with the teeth on the serrated models being hand-cut, one at a time, until the mid-20th century.
The Falci Co. of Italy (established in 1921 as a union of several formerly independent forges) developed its own unique method of industrial-scale serrated-sickle production in 1965. Its innovations, which included a tapered blade cross-section (thicker at the back - for strength - gradually thinning towards the edge - for ease of penetration) were later adopted by Europe's largest sickle producer in Spain as well as, more recently, by a company in India.
A serrated sickle was used for harvesting wheat, the ears being held bunched up in the free hand as described above. After this the straw was cut with a scythe. Oats and barley on the other hand were simply scythed. The reason for this is that wheat straw, unlike that of oats or barley, whose softer straw was suitable only for bedding or fodder, was a valuable crop, used for thatching, and subjecting it to the battering of a flail would have rendered it useless for this purpose.
The blades of sickle models intended primarily for the cutting of grass are sometimes "cranked", meaning they are off-set downwards from the handle, which makes it easier to keep the blade closer to the ground. Sickles used for reaping do not benefit by this feature because cereals are usually not cut as close to the ground surface. Instead, what distinguishes this latter group is their often (though not always) serrated edges.
A blade which is used regularly to cut the silica-rich stems of cereal crops acquires a characteristic sickle-gloss, or wear pattern.
It was also used in lieu of the bean hook or pea hook for cutting field beans and other leguminous crops that were used for fodder and bedding for livestock.
Sometimes confused with the heavier and straighter billhook used for cutting wood or laying hedges. While the scythe or bagging hook blade was heavy enough to remove young growth instead of, say, shears for clipping a hedge, it was not strong enough to cut woody material for which the stronger, similarly shaped, but longer handled, staff hook was used. Many variations in blade shape were used in different parts of England and known under a variety of names. Its close relations in shape and usage are the grass hook and the reap hook.
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