During the winter months, weather conditions make outside work impossible. The women are busy in the houses, using time spared from the daily cooking and cleaning for weaving, mending, knitting and spinning; but for about four months, from the end of November to the end of March, the men have no work to do but feed and water the animals, which are kept in the stables and fed on straw, eked out with some meal or bought feed.
As soon as the spring comes, the men get busy. The oxen weakened by the long winter must be got into training for work, and spring ploughing and sowing must be done. The ox-herds and shepherds take charge of the animals. The sheep are lambing and in each household a woman must be ready at midday to milk the ewes. Ploughing and sowing of spring wheat and barley is immediately followed by the ploughing of the year's fallow, which goes on perhaps into May, even until June, depending on individual circumstances. Meanwhile, the vineyards must be dug over, and potatoes and other vegetables sown. Most of this latter work is done by women.
In June, all the grasses and weeds growing in odd places among the crops are cut for hay, again mostly by women. During late May and June the men are comparatively idle. In July the harvest begins, first with vetch and lentils, then with the main crops of rye and wheat. Threshing follows the reaping; reaping, threshing, and storing together last for about two months, two months of ceaseless activity for everyone; a whole household frequently works right through a moonlit night.
In September the pressure eases. As soon as rain falls on the