Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

212 FISH xMANIA—VITELLIUS—APICIUS—COOKSa poem on the oyster !To be more accurate, he wrote two,iand lengthy ones to boot !The Emperor Domitian (Juvenal, IV.) ordered a specialsitting of the Senate to deliberate and advise on a matter ofsuch grave State importance as the best method of cookinga turbot.Greek and Roman writers frequently poke fun at thegourmets who asserted that they could instantly tell from theflavour whence the fish came : from what sea, and what partof that sea, from what river, and even from which side of thatriver. 2Either these ancient connoisseurs were blessed with a moreexquisite and developed sense of taste than we moderns, orthe whole pose was an intolerable affectation, for " theydrenched their subtly-conceived dishes with garum, alec, andother sauces, which were so strong and composite that itwould have been hardly possible to distinguish a fresh fishfrom a putrid cat—except by the bones " 3!This assertion is none too strong, if the receipts for thesesauces be duly pondered. Mention of garum, which gets itsname from being made originally from the salted blood andentrails of a fish called garon or garos by the Greeks, is inclassical writers very general : we find it even in .^schylusand Sophocles. 4^ Ausonius, Epist., 5 and 15. But, after all, our own Keats, addressing hisfavourite Moon, did not hesitate to write :* Pliny, IX.. " thou art a relief"To the poor patient oyster ![Endymion, III. 66 f.)primus . . . adiudicavit 79: "Is (Sergiuseadem aquatilium genera aliubiTiberi amne inter duos pontesGrata)atque. . etaliubialia generameliora,similiter,sicut lupinequandopiscesculinarumincensura peragahir." See Horace, Sat., II. 2, 31 ff. Also Columella, R.R., VIII.16, 4: " Fastidire docuit fiuvialem lupum, nisi quem Tiberis adverso torrentedefatigasset "; and also Juvenal IV. 139 ii. :" Nulli maior fuit usus edendiTempestate mea : Circeis nata forent anLucrinum ad saxum Rutupinove edita fundoOstrea, callebat primo deprendere morsu,Et semel aspecti litus dicebat echini."More of the same sort is to be read in Macrob., Sat., III. 16, 16-18.* Robinson, op. cit., p. 45.* ^sch., Proteus frag., 211; Nauck^ and Soph., Triptolemos, frag. 606Jebb, ap. Poll. 6. 65 and Athen., II. 75.