Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

56 INTRODUCTIONTreatyse of Fysshynge with an Angle, printed at Westminster byWynkyn de Worde in 1496 as part of the second edition ofThe Boke of St. Albans. Whether, as has been commonlysupposed, Dame Juliana Berners wrote it, or whether anysuch lady ever existed, are points of controversy, but thatThe Treatyse was not an immaculate conception, withoutparents or ancestors, can be reasonably proved by its referenceto earher writers on fishing, and to its " these ben the xii fliesye shall use " being introduced as a precept of practice ratherthan a revelation of invention.If few the forbears of what some term " not only thefirst angUng manual in England, but also the first practicalwork written in any language," its vitahty and its prolificprogeny admit of no doubt. According to Mr. A. Lang (whoaccounts for the startling fact by the increased number ofpeople able to read owing to the spread of education)no lessthan ten editions of The Boke were issued within four years ofpublication, while Dr. Turrell limits himself to fourteenundated editions between 1500 and 1596.Whatever the number of the editions, the need for and thevitahty of The Treatyse is demonstrated by the fact that forover a hundred years no new work on Anghng was printed inEngland, and between it and The Compleat Angler—a space ofover one hundred and fifty years—there occur but four bookson the subject.! Xo its prohfic progeny, the BibliothecaPiscatoria bears witness 2 in its catalogue of some fifteenhundred authors and of countless books, MSS. etc.We owe, it is said, this voluminous hterature to thegeographical position of England, which lends itself veryfavourably to the pursuit of all kinds of fishing. Can we, also,flatteringly add the other factor of Lacepede's dictum, " IIya cette difference entre la chasse et la peche, que cette derniere"convient aux peuples les plus civilises ?But the pursuit of fishing did not prevail in early England»Cf. M.G. Watkins, Introduction to the Treatyse, etc. (London, 1880), p. xi.2 It enumerates 3158 distinct editions of 2148 different fishing workspublished before 1883. The Supplement issued by Mr. R. B. Marston in 1901gives 1200 more. Mr. Eric Parker's delightsome and pocket-companionableAn Angler's Garland, London, 1920, gives many happy extracts from thefefteen hundred, and present-daj' writers.