shadoof

noun

1. A device used since ancient times in the Middle East to raise water from a well or other low point, consisting of a pivoted rod with a bucket on one end and a counterweight on the other.

   “The waters intended for irrigating lands situated on the sides of the hills and at the bottom of a valley, are first raised to the top by a balance called deloo, or shadoof.”

   “From this deeper kind of well the water is usually drawn by hand in a leathern bucket not too heavy, sometimes by a windlass, but oftener, where the well is only of moderate depth, by the shadoof, which is the most common and simple of all the machines used in the East for raising water, whether from wells, reservoirs, or rivers.”

   “The Egyptian fellaheen, in many of their ways and customs, reproduce almost exactly their ancient prototypes. They use the same ploughs and the same shadoofs for raising water.”

   “It was the time of low Nile when all the land is baked like a crust of bread, when the creaking of the shadoofs and the singing croak of the sakkia are heard the night long like untiring crickets with throats of frogs.”