Jethro Tull (baptised 30 March 1674 – 21 February 1741, New Style) was an English agriculturist from Berkshire who helped to bring in regards to the British Agricultural Revolution of the 18th century. He perfected a horse-drawn seed drill in 1701 that economically sowed the seeds in neat rows, and later developed a horse-drawn hoe. Tull’s methods have been adopted by many landowners and helped to supply the basis for modern agriculture. Tull was in all probability born in Basildon, Berkshire, to Jethro Tull, Sr, and his wife Dorothy, née Buckeridge. He was baptised there on 30 March 1674. He grew up in Bradfield, Berkshire and matriculated at St John’s College, Oxford, at the age of 17. He trained for the authorized profession, however seems not to have taken a degree. He turned a member of Staple Inn, and was known as to the bar on eleven December 1693 by the benchers of Gray’s Inn. Tull married Susanna Smith of Burton Dassett, Warwickshire.
They settled on his father’s farm at Howberry, close to Crowmarsh Gifford, Oxfordshire, where that they had one son and two daughters. Soon after his call to the bar, Tull became ailing with a pulmonary disorder and travelled to Europe searching for a cure. He was for a substantial period at Montpellier within the south of France. During his tour, Tull fastidiously in contrast the agriculture of France and Italy with that of his own country, and omitted no occasion to observe and notice every little thing which supported his own views and discoveries. On multiple occasion, he alluded in his work to the similarity of his own horse-hoe husbandry to the observe followed by the vine-dressers of the south of Europe in always hoeing or otherwise stirring their ground. Finding that they didn’t approve of dunging their vineyards, Tull readily adduced the fact in favour of his personal favourite principle: that manuring soil is an unnecessary operation. St Bartholomew’s Church, Lower Basildon, Berkshire (now redundant), the place he had been baptised.
In his travels, Tull found himself in search of more knowledge of agriculture. Influenced by the early Age of Enlightenment, he is taken into account to be one of the early proponents of a scientific – and particularly empirical – strategy to agriculture. He helped rework agricultural practices by inventing or bettering numerous implements. Tull made early advances in planting crops together with his invention of the seed drill (1701) – a mechanical seeder that sowed efficiently at the correct depth and spacing after which coated the seed in order that it could grow. Before the introduction of the seed drill, the frequent follow was to plant seeds by broadcasting (evenly throwing) them throughout the bottom by hand on the prepared soil and then evenly harrowing the soil to bury the seeds to the correct depth. In his 1731 publication, Tull described how the motivation for developing the seed-drill arose from battle along with his servants. He had struggled to enforce his new methods upon them, partially as a result of they resisted the menace to their place as labourers and their ability with the plough.
