THRASHING, or THRESHING, in agriculture, the art of beating the corn out of the ears.
There are two ways of separating corn from the ear; the first by beating it with a flail, which is properly what is called thrashing. The other method, still practised in several countries, is to make mules, or horses, trample on it, backwards and forwards; this is properly what the ancients called tritura and trituratio. The Hebrews used oxen therein, and sometimes yoked four together for this purpose. Another way among the ancients was with a kind of sledge, made of boards joined together, and laden with stones or iron, upon which a man was mounted, and the whole drawn over the corn by horses: this instrument was called traba, or tribula.