Page:Horse shoes and horse shoeing.djvu/437

 of oxen used in ploughing, and heifers or stotts in harrowing, were shod at threepence each.

It is necessary here to remark, that Richardson derives the word 'stott' from the Anglo-Saxon stod-hors, and as applied to oxen from the Swedish stut, Danish stud, a steer. The word has given rise to some discussion, it having been used for a very long time in Scotland as a designation for a steer, heifer, or bullock, and the notice in the above is thought by the antiquarian who quotes it, to mean heifer. Of this, however, there may be considerable doubt; as the term has been constantly applied in England to under-sized strong horses or cobs. In the 'Vision of Piers Plowman' (1362?) it occurs in this sense:

And Chaucer, in his 'Canterbury Pilgrims,' says:

Signifying, I think, that the word came from beyond the Tweed. Sir David Lyndsay also applies it to a horse. On a part of the border of the so-called Bayeux tapestry, representing the landing of William the Conqueror and the battle of Hastings, a piece of needlework by some ascribed to Saxon embroiderers, there is a representation of a man driving a horse attached to a harrow—one of the earliest instances we have of horses being used in field-labour; but which was a common enough custom in the time of Richard II.