Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

148 PLINY—MARTIAL—WAS THE ROD JOINTED?from Friedlander, who contents himself with a mere referenceto Martial, Ep., XIV. 218, quoted below.Paley is of doubtful or little avail. He holds that harundomeans the fowler's reed. The implement was so contrived thata smaller reed, tipped with birdlime {viscuni),^ made from thecherries of the mistletoe, was suddenly protruded (perhapsblown) through a thicker reed against a bird on its perch, andthat to this lengthening crescente refers. Cf. Ep., XIV. 218." Non tantum calamis, sed cantu fallitur ales,Callida dum tacita crescit harundo manu."The fowler attracted the attention of the bird as he approachedit, by imitating its note.Propertius refers to fowling {Vertumnus, V. 2, 33), andin Petronius [Sat., 109, 7) we find " volucres, quas textis harundinibusperitus artifex tetigit." 3 Textis here, which Mr.Heseltine renders ' jointed,' would seem to show Paley 'ssuggestion, that the first cane was hollow, while the secondwas " protruded " through it, to be wrong.Rich explains this method of fowling as follows. Thesportsman first hung the cage with his call bird on the bough^ Cf. Virgil, Geor., I. 139. Also Oppian, Cyneg., I. 65 f., where, as toolsof the fowler, are specified, " long cords, and moist honey-coloured bird-lime,and reeds which tread their track through the air." Cf. also Ovid, Mei.,XV. 477, " nee volucrem viscata fallite virga."* Cantu seems to refer more naturally to the song of the call bird (Oppian,hal., ly. 120 ff.), rather than to that of the fowler, but cf. Cato (the poet ofthe third century a.d.), in Disticha, I. 27, " Fistula dulce canit volucrem dumdecipit auceps "; and Tibullus, II. 5, 31, " Fistula cui semper decrescitharundinis ordo." In addition to catching birds by rods and birdlime, acommon practice according to Aristophanes was to confine doves, etc., withlimbs tied up or with eyes covered, in a net, and thus allure other doves, etc.,to the snare. Illex was the technical name for the decoy bird. For thispurpose use was made both of kindred and of hostile species, such as the owland falcon. The latter was also trained to catch the bird, which had beendecoyed within its reach. Cf. Martial, Ep., XIV. 218. Aristophanes, Aves,1082 f.Tas irepiaTfpds 6' 6/j.oiiiis ^vWa^iiv t'lp^as ex*'KanapayKa^et TtuAevfip StSe/xtvas (" SiKrvci).Ibid., 526 ff., trans. B. H. Kennedy :Plautus. Asin., I. 3, 67 f. :" And the cunning fowlers for you setSnare and springs, twig, trap, gin, cage, and net."" iEdis nobis area est, auceps sum ego,Esca est meretrix, lectus illex est, amatores aves."• Cf. Petronius, Sat., 40, 6, and Bion, Id., 4, 5.