America's first tractor

A tractor is a vehicle intended for drawing, towing, pushing or pulling something which cannot propel itself and, often, powering it too. Most commonly the word is used to describe a vehicle intended for pulling some other vehicle or object (see traction unit).

The word comes from the Latin trahere "to pull". A conflicting history of the name suggests that steam tractors were originally referred to as traction engines, with the word "tractor" eventually deriving from a contraction of 'traction' and 'motor'.