# The System of Hungarian Farming

The earliest form of land-use most certainly was the parlagolás (leaving land uncultivated), by which they left off cultivating the exhausted land and broke up new land to replace it. The used land was left to rest for 8 to 10 years or even longer and only then was it cultivated again. Naturally this method could survive only as long as there was enough land. It was renewed after the Turks withdrew (18th century), even in areas where it had not been used earlier. In the Great Plain the exhausted {197.} plough land was left to pasture. The stock fertilized it, grass grew over it, and thus it regained its productivity.

The opposite of parlag is ugar (fallow). Both words are Slavic in origin and testify that we took over this system from one of the Slavic peoples. They divide the fields into two or three sections and through the year keep half or one-third resting. On this basis we can speak of two- or three-course rotation farming. The stock grazes the fallow land for a year and fertilizes it to a certain degree. The turned-over weeds and roots also help to rejuvenate the land. In areas of husbandry the two-, and in other places the three-course system of rotation prevailed, though finally the latter became generally used.

This system spread increasingly from the 13th century on and basically prevailed up to the 19th century. By then at most places the fallow lands were sown, usually with spring wheat, and even more with fodder or root crops. On those parts of the country where the fallow system prevailed, we find permanent plough fields outside the villages beginning from the Middle Ages. These were cultivated without rest. Their name, tanor, tanorok, originally meant a plough field fenced with spiky branches. The name, of Slavic origin, also indicates this. The cleared area (irtás) was not divided into the rotating land system but was sowed every year.

In the Carpathian Basin we differentiate farming methods of the mountain and hill regions and that of the Great Plain. Leaving fields fallow (ugar) is primarily connected to the previous method. It was also characterized by the longer use of the sickle here, by the tying of the grain crop into sheaves stacked in the shape of a cross, and by beating the seeds out with a threshing flail. This work was carried out in the barn where harvested grain was often stored until winter. In the Great Plain the major part of the farm work was done out of doors, which is why we do not find barns in this area. The grain crop was cut with a scythe in earlier times and gathered with rakes into bunches. These were hauled into the threshing yards set up at the end of the plough fields, and threshed by treading out, usually with horses. In the plains grain was kept mostly in underground pits that had been hardened and cleaned by burning.

The separation of the two systems can be shown primarily in the 18th and 19th centuries. For a long time, the Great Plain style of farming was thought to be a nomadic tradition going back to the time of the Conquest, but more recent research has proved that it began to develop only in the 16th century, its characteristics having been strengthened during the Turkish occupation, and especially afterwards. However, the differences began to fade in the second half of the 19th century as the result of similar tendencies in general development.