Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

:There"THE MANNA OF THE MEDITERRANEAN"loi" Delphinus veterum cordibus atqtie animis se insinuavit,thynnus gulis atque veniriculis." ^The annual campaign of the Tunny fishing, lasting fromMay 15 to Oct. 25, was based on a regular and thorough organisation.All the boats of a given section of the coast actedunder the orders of an elected Captain, whose word was law.Descriptions of fishing for Tunny and Pelamyde—thename given to the young Tunny from his habit of buryinghimself in the mud {irriXio fxmiv)," a derivation often attributedto Aristotle, see //. ^., VIII. 15, or of herding together [iri\uvana) according to Plutarch—may befound in Aristotle, N. H.,IV. 10, and VIII. 15, in Pliny, H. N., IX. 53, in ^lian, de nat.an., XV. 5 and 6, and in Oppian, hal, IV. 531 ff. The storyby the last of the Thracians piercing and taking myriadsof mutilated Pelamydes from the mud, in which they havefor warmth ensconced themselves, merits reading if only forhis indignant burst" The various Tortures of the bleeding ShoalCommand a Pity from the stoutest Soul." ^Aristophanes {Hipp., 313) compares Cleon to the watchposted on a cliff or height to signal the advent of the Tunnies,a position (as Theocritus (III. 26) and Oppian {hal., IV. 637)show), very similar to that of the " Hooer " in the pilchardfishery of Cornwall at the present day.These look-outs were frequently artificial. ^Elian, de nat.an., XV. 5, describes a scaffolding consisting of two fir treesbetween which many cross pieces were fastened. The long1 Paulus Rhode, Thynnorum Capiura (Lipsiae, 1890). Had his exhaustivemonograph come to hand earUer, this notice would have been worthier, andmuch time spent on Aristotle, Oppian, etc., have been saved.* The real derivation of TrriKafivs, which was probably a pre-Hellenicword, seems unknown : see fe. Boisacq, Dictionnaire Etymologique de la languegrecque (Paris, 1913), p. 779.* Their method was to let down by a rope from the boats blocks of wood(heavily weighted with lead) to which were attached great spikes and hooks,which on reaching the bottom were drawn to and fro, with the result that" here gasping Heads confess the killing Smart, bleeds a Tail, which|quivers round the Dart." Cf. a fragment from Menander's The Fisherman,frag. 12 in the Frag, comicor. Graec, IV. 77, Meineke, " The muddy sea whichnourishes the great Tunny." Sophron's Tunnyfisher seems the earliest mime,where this fish figures.