Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

THE FOWLER'S ROD JOINTED 149of a tree, under which, or at some convenient distance from it,he contrived to conceal himself. When a bird, attracted bythe singing of its companion, perched on the branches, hequietly inserted his rod amongst the boughs until it reachedhis prey, which stuck to thelime and was thus drawn tothe ground. When the treewas very high, the rod wasmade in separate joints, likeour fishing rod, so that hecould lengthen itout until itreached the object of hispursuit, whence it is termedcrescens or texta.If the example given byRich (from a terra-cottalamp)be faithfully rendered,the joints in the rod are easilydiscernible. ^But allquestion as to theexistence of a jointed fowlingrod is now settled pastperadventure by PI. 24, Fig.686, in the Brit. Mus. Cat.THE FOWLER.From Brit. Mus. Cat. of Lamps,PI. 24, Fig. 686.of Gr. and Rom. Lamps, 1914. This shows an animal dressed ina hooded cloak, holding in his right hand a length of fowlingrod, and in his left two spare lengths, trying to reach a treeon which sits a bird. Mr. Walters, the editor of the catalogue,kindly informs me that Fig. 686 can no longer be regardedas that of The Fox and the Grapes. Similar lamps shownin S. Loeschcke's recent Lampen aus Vindonissa, e.g. PL 12,No. 473, confirm the evidence of the Brit. Mus. lamp in everydetail.Not a few editors, on the other hand, retain vadis in Martial's^ A. Rich, Diet, of Rom. and Gk. Antiquities, London, 1874, s.v. ' Arundo.'I have been unable to trace this lamp in either Birch or Passeri. Darembergand Saglio, op. cit., seem to collect most of the information on the subject,s.v. ' Venatio,' V. p. 694. The above and other methods of aucupium, " birdcatching,"prevail to a devastating extent in Italy at the present day.