concept
Timber rafting (splav)
timber raft
also: плот, плоты, сплав, сплавщики
The seasonal trade of floating bound-log rafts downriver on the spring meltwater flood, crewed by the poorest peasant men and women (raftsmen, splavshchiki) working constant pole-labor to keep the raft off the banks through a winding river's turns, run by merchants who dispatch rafts in numbered batches and race the falling water level.
Reading notes
- On the River §8 the timber rafts begin to appear
Once the ice has cleared, the spring floodwater is put to economic use: merchants float bound-log rafts (plots) downriver to market, the second half of the sketch's two-part structure (ice, then rafts).