FISH IN SACRIFICES—PICKLED FISH—VIVARIA OF OYSTERS, ETC.—ARCHIMEDES
The Feast Day, _Ludi_, of the Tiber fishermen was celebrated on the
Campus Martius in June under the management of the _Prætor Urbanus_
with much ceremony. Ovid[504] sings:
“Festa dies illis qui lina madentia ducunt,
Quique tegunt parvis æra recurva cibis.”
The custom of offering to the Gods fish (although rarer than that
of animals) certainly and widely prevailed. Proof can be piled on
proof—_pace_ a passage from Plutarch and _pace_ the contention that the
practice is not purely Hellenic—from the pages of both Greek and Roman
authors.
Take, for instance, the statement of Agatharchides of Knidos: that the
largest eels from Lake Copaïs were sacrificed by the Bœotians, who
crowned them like human victims, and after sprinkling them with meal
offered prayers over them.[505] Or the story in Posidonius the Stoic of
Sarpedon celebrating his victory by “sacrificing to Neptune, who puts
armies to flight, enormous quantities of fish.”[506] Theocritus in his
fragmentary _Berenice_, Ælian,[507] and Antigonus on the offering of
the Tunny all confirm the custom.[508]
Plutarch (_Symp._, VIII. 3) would seem indeed the only exception: he
straightly asserts, according to Nonnius and others, that “no fish is
fitting for offering or sacrifice.”[509]
This is but another instance of Plutarch’s being saddled with
responsibility for some expression or opinion uttered by one of his
characters, as is clearly shown by the words: “Sylla, commending the
discourse, added with regard to the Pythagoreans that they tasted
especially the flesh sacrificed to the gods, but that no fish is fit
for offering or sacrifices.”
P. Stengel holds that fish, with the curious exception of the Eel,
were not sacrificed to the gods in early days, because they neither
possessed blood which could be poured forth at the altar, nor could
they be offered up alive as could be an enemy, a sacrifice which found
special favour in divine eyes.[510]
This statement, unless explained in some manner, contrasts queerly
with the passage in Plutarch’s _Life of Numa Pompilius_, where the
king is taught by Picus and Faunus, reinforced subsequently by
Jupiter himself, to make a lustration “as a charm against thunder and
lightning, composed of Onions, Hair, and Pilchards!” Lest these curious
constituents arouse your mirth and infect you with doubt as to their
efficacy, hearken unto Plutarch’s further words, “which is used even
unto this day!”
From this account (wittily versed by Ovid)[511] we discover Jupiter,
resentful at being brought down to earth by the magic of Picus
and Faunus, ordering the charm to consist “of Heads”—“Of onions,”
replied Numa. “Human”—“Hairs,” said Numa, desirous to fence against
the dreadful injunction, and interrupting the god. “Living,” said
Jupiter—“Pilchards,” broke in Numa.
Whether fish were but rarely sacrificed or not, Festus[512] at any
rate makes clear that at the _Ludi_ on June 7th, and possibly the
_Volcanalia_ in September (although at the latter the oblations were
mostly animal), Roman fishermen did offer up fish, “quod id genus
pisciculorum vivorum datur ei Deo pro animis humanis.”
Offerings of fish may be (as O. Keller suggests) a relic of Totemism
resting on the belief that the spirits of men after death pass into
fish.
The suggestion gains force when we remember that Anaximander[513] and
others taught that men lived once as fishes, but later came on land
and threw off their scales; and that the early religious conceptions
of Latium were so debased as readily to engender or harbour such a
conception. On the other hand, it must be admitted that not a single
clear and convincing case of Totemism has hitherto been adduced from
the Græco-Italic area.
In these oblations and in Varro’s “Populus _pro se_ in ignem animalia
mittit,”[514]—an animal in place of a man be it remarked—can be
detected a mitigated survival of the widespread custom of human
sacrifice in propitiation of a deity.[515] On much the same lines grew
up the custom, as civilisation progressed, of burning the weapons of,
instead of killing, the captured foe, after a battle. The immolation
of prisoners formed a sacrifice not so much of revenge, as one in
honour of the slain on the side of the victors: such at least is the
conclusion suggested to me by the words of Festus, “humanum sacrificium
dicebant, quod mortui causa fiebat.”[516]
As offerings at Rome had dwindled from men down to animals, or small
fish, or eventually even salt or pickled fish, or fish mixed with
wheat, so among the Israelites the Scape-Goat had become the vicarious
victim offered up to Jehovah “for the sins of all the people,” and
among the Assyrians the oblation had even shrunk to little fishes, made
of ivory or metal.
Fish, in addition to being worshipped as gods or held so sacred that
eating them was prohibited, were frequently used by the Priests or by
the Augurs for divinatory purposes. In accordance with their swimming
or not, and in what direction, with their leaps into the air, how,
whence, and whither effected, with their reception, or refusal, or
smashing with their tails of particular foods, were framed the oracular
deliverances or priestly predictions, as Plutarch and others show.[517]
Thus at the spring of Limyra in Lycia, if the fish seized food thrown
to them greedily, the omen was favourable; if they flapped at it with
their tails, the reverse.[518] In Lydia (according to Varro[519]) from
their movements, when rising to the surface at the sound of a flute,
the watching seer deduced and delivered his answer. Divination was not
limited to certain holy waters; when in the war between Augustus and
Sextus Pompeius a fish darted from the sea and threw itself at the feet
of the former, the ready augur found no difficulty in acclaiming him as
the future “Ruler of the Waves.”[520]
Ichthyic soothsaying held its ground among the Greeks of the Byzantine
empire. One prediction[521]—when a boiled fish shall spring out of
the pot, then the last hour of Constantinople will have struck—is of
present-day importance. But whether the fish has filled his saltatory
_rôle_, and if so whether the doom of the city _has_ sounded, lie for
decision at the moment of writing on the lap of the Big Four in Paris.
The belief that fish could and did foretell events lingered long in
England; thus the deaths of Henry II. and of Cromwell were foreshadowed
by the fighting of fish among themselves in the _vivaria_ belonging to
Henry II. and Cromwell.[522]
As is but natural in hot countries, the trade in salted and pickled
fish, the τάριχος of the Greeks, the _salsamentum_ of the Romans, grew
to great importance.[523]
This sweet-sour comestible was among both nations early, universal, and
pushed to the extreme of madness.[524] In such high esteem was it held
that it came to be looked on as an offering meet for the gods. Cato and
others testify to the exorbitant prices commanded by Pontic and kindred
_salsamentum_, of which a small flask fetched more than one hundred
sheep! Of every kind—and they were as diverse as the countries and
towns that furnished them—we find champions ready to go to the stake to
prove the superiority of their own pet choice.
Of some towns it was the chief, if not the only, commerce. As modern
towns frequently bear for their arms or on their seal some device
connected with their history or trade, so ancient seaports which
produced _salsamentum_ often stamped their coins with the figures of
fish, etc.
Thus Olbia, one of the most important markets for salt or pickled
fish, bears on its money an eagle taking a fish,[525] while a copper
coin of Carteia[526] depicts an angler, possibly Mercury—a god of
fishing. Sinope, and many other places, have left similar numismatic
representations. Of most interest from a monetary point of view are the
Greek diobols of Tarentum. Those bearing the figure of Taras on his
dolphin passed as current token in the fish market.[527]
[Illustration: TWO MEN FISHING, FROM COINS OF CARTEIA.
From A. Heiss, 49, 20-21. See N. 1.]
Famous for the beauty of their execution were some of the Syracusan
coins, representing the head of Arethusa surrounded by dolphins. The
accounts of the legend vary. Shortly, the lovely maid of the train of
Artemis fled the embraces of her lover Alpheus,
“Arethusa arose
From her couch of snows
In the Acroceraunian Mountains,”
and prevailed on Oceanus to open a way through his waves till reaching
seeming safety in the Isle of Ortygia, close to Syracuse, she welled
forth in the midst of the salt sea a fountain of sweet pure water.
Alpheus, not to be outdone, got himself transformed into a river to
emerge also at Ortygia and to mix his stream with the spring of the
nymph.
Around her head or amidst her hair on Syracusan coins dart dolphins
(some hold eels, which were sacred to Artemis), symbolic of the sea,
to show that the sweetness of the fountain was still untainted by the
surrounding salt of the ocean.[528] Sweet the water may have been,
but Athenæus (II. 16) characterises it as “of invincible hardness.”
These coins are the work of those great masters, Cimon, Euaenetus,
and an unknown third, the ‘New Artist’ of Sir Arthur Evans.[529] On
an electrum coin of Syracuse an octopus is well delineated, while the
obverse shows a veiled female head in profile.[530]
[Illustration: ARETHUSA, FROM A TETRADRACHM OF SYRACUSE BY CIMON.
From G. F. Hill’s _Handbook of Coins_, Pl. 6, Fig. 6.]
The octopus, judging by the fact that at Mycenæ in one tomb alone
Dr. Schliemann excavated fifty-three golden models of it, and by
the many gold ornaments of which the fish forms the chief or only
figure, was undoubtedly a very frequent and favourite subject for the
craftsmen of the ‘Minoan’ age, although it did not bulk so big in early
Mediterranean religion as L. Siret would make out.[531]
The taxes or duties derived from fish or fishing furnished the
_peculiar_ of the Temples at Delos, Ephesus, and elsewhere: at
Byzantium and some other places they went to the city. After the Roman
conquests these imposts were paid not to the cities (Cyzicus and other
places were the exceptions), but to the State, and were gathered by the
intermediary “publicans.”[532]
With stories before him, such as those of the suppers recorded by the
dozen in Athenæus, and given to and by the Emperor Vitellius, for which
the fish were brought in ships of war from the Carpathian Sea and
the Straits of Spain, it is no wonder that a modern author is driven
to conclude that the ancients thought more of the edible than the
sporting qualities of the fish. They ransacked the habitable globe for
side-dishes, but did not trouble themselves about the precepts of Mrs.
Glasse.
Apart from this ransacking of the globe, the Romans developed, as the
demand for fish by rich and poor alike grew ever greater, the Egyptian
and Assyrian _vivarium_ to a marvellous extent.
Built at first (as Columella avers[533]) simply for the purpose of
supplying fresh fish for the table, they found such favour that no
self-respecting Roman could afford to be without his _vivarium_.
With the rich they were the occasion of most costly ostentation and
extravagant expenditure.
Whether Sergius Aurata (or Orata) took or not his cognomen[534] from
the fish _Aurata_, all writers identify him as the first to build
a _vivarium_ for oysters. From their sale, from the income derived
from the vapour baths (_pensiles balineas_), of which he was also the
pioneer, and from the villas erected on his property, close to Baiæ,
the baths, and the oysters, he amassed an enormous fortune. He posed
as the Pontiff of the Palate; his was the final decision, from which
lay no appeal, as to which sea or which part of what river produced the
best of the various fishes.
From the not unnatural bias of owner and founder he adjudged the
Lucrine oysters finest of all. Pliny’s words (IX. 79) that, when Orata
“ennobled” the Lucrine, British oysters had not yet reached Rome convey
a gratifying compliment to our insular pride, somewhat dashed by Pliny
plumping for the Circeian.[535]
Oysters throve with travelling and a change to new waters.[536] The
Brundisian oyster when planted in Lake Lucrinus not only kept its own
flavour, but took on that of its new home.
Apicius, not our gourmet M. Gabius, but an initialless successor, would
have proved an admirable Quartermaster-General.[537] When “Trajan was
in Parthia at a distance of many days’ journey from the sea, he sent
him oysters, which he kept fresh by a clever contrivance of his own
invention; real oysters not like the sham anchovies which the cook of
Nicomedes, king of the Bithynians, made for him,” when far inland and
yearning for oysters.
In a comedy by Euphron,[538] a _chef_ sings his teacher’s marvellous
skill:—
“I am the pupil of Soterides
Who when his king was distant from the sea
Full twelve days’ journey and in winter’s depth
Fed him with rich anchovies to his wish
And made the guests to marvel.
B. How was that?
A. He took a _female_ turnip, shred it fine
Into the figure of the delicate fish.”
* * * * *
No wonder the king spake to his admiring guests thus:—
“A cook is quite as useful as a poet,
And quite as wise, as these anchovies show it.”
To Fulvius Herpinus or Lippinus belongs the credit of being the
first—just before the Civil War—to fatten the _Cochlea_, or sea-snail,
in a _vivarium_. By careful collecting from Africa and Illyrica and
skilful feeding, his cockles became renowned for size and number.[539]
In the period between the taking of Carthage and the reign of
Vespasian, the taste in fish became a perfect passion; for its
gratification Proconsuls enriched, like our Clives from India, beyond
the dreams of avarice by the spoils of Asia and Africa, incurred the
most lavish expense. Thus Licinius Muræna, Quintus Hortensius, Lucius
Philippus constructed immense basins,[540] which they filled with rare
species. Lucullus, like the Persian king at Athos, but with unlike
motive, caused even a mountain to be pierced to introduce sea-water
into his fish-ponds, and for the achievement was dubbed by Pompey,
“Togatus Xerxes.”[541]
But in many cases the huge outlay was repaid with interest. Varro[542]
avers that Hirrius (who first before all others designed and carried
out the _vivarium_ for _Murænæ_) received twelve million sesterces
in rent from his properties, and employed the entire sum in the care
of his fishes! At the death of Lucullus the fish in his stew-ponds
realised over £32,000.
The rich Patricians were not satisfied with a single pond; their fish
preserves were divided into compartments where they kept different
kinds. In case any reader, like the Third Fisherman in Shakespeare’s
_Pericles_,
“Marvel how the fishes live in the sea,”
I hasten to endorse the
_First Fisherman_: “Why as men do on land; the great ones eat
up the little ones,”
and to add that the fish confined in these separate ponds found in the
waters their business and livelihood from the _testaceæ_ purposely
planted.
This passion for _piscinæ_ gradually impoverished the Mediterranean
and other seas. Fish in the Tyrrhenian Sea had no time to come to
maturity, because as Columella complains, “Maria ipsa Neptunumque
clauserunt!”[543] While Varro and Columella give careful directions as
to the making and keeping of practical fish stews, they keep silence as
to methods of capturing the inhabitants.
I have come across no notice of _vivaria_ among the Greeks:[544] their
kinsman in Sicily erected at least one magnificent example. Diodorus
Siculus (XI. 2) tells us that the Agrigentines (probably by the labour
of the Carthaginian prisoners) “sunk a fishpond, with great costs
and expenses, seven furlongs in compass, and twenty cubits in depth:
in this water, brought both from fountains and rivers, fish were
planted which soon supplied them with an ample stock both for food and
pleasure.”
To the great Archimedes is due the unique achievement of a _vivarium_
on board ship. It is impossible here to set forth all the glories of
this wonderful vessel, intended for the corn traffic between Egypt and
Sicily, and propelled by means of huge sweeps—every sweep worked by a
team of twenty men (εἰκοσόρος).
Her Gymnasium, her three Baths, her Flower Garden, her trellised
Vineyard, her Temple to Venus, her Library with its floor of mosaics
exhibiting a series of subjects taken from the _Iliad_, and, lastly,
in the bow by the side of the huge reservoir of 21,000 gallons, her
water-tight well, made of planks lined with lead, and filled with
_sea_-water, in which a great number of fish were always kept—if all
these wonders of a ship, launched over 2200 years ago, do not cause
us to think a little, and to abate our boasts over our _Imperators_
and _Olympics_, then to the cocksure conceit of the twentieth century
naught is of avail, not even the account given by Moschion.[545]
Disregarding the practical directions of Varro (whom Schneider[546]
stamps, with regard to fish, etc., as a mere plagiarist of Greek
authors), of Columella, and in a lesser degree of Pliny how to
construct and conduct paying stew-ponds, and turning a deaf ear to
Varro’s warning that “to build, stock, and keep them up was most
costly,” the Romans thought no money, no time, too much to expend on
_vivaria_.[547] Possession and cultivation of fish in _vivaria_, which
were sometimes made in the dining-room, became the one delight of these
“Tritones Piscinarum,” as Cicero dubs two of his friends.
The primary cause for their existence, a ready supply of fresh fish in
a hot climate, was forgotten. Other owners resembled Hortensius, who
(according to Varro) “not only was never entertained by his fish at
table, but was scarcely ever easy, unless engaged in entertaining or
fattening _them_.” The death of “his friend,” the _Muræna_, between
whom and himself such a close attachment existed, almost broke his
heart.[548]
Macrobius testifies that Crassus, “first among all the greatest men of
Rome, mourned a _muræna_” (probably it of the earrings and necklace of
precious stones) “found dead in his _vivarium_ even as a daughter.” It
was on the occasion of Domitius twitting him with “Did you not weep
when your fish died?” that Crassus got back with “Did you not bury
three wives and never weep at all?”[549]
Of Hortensius Varro continues:[550] “His mullet give him infinitely
more concern than my mules and asses do; for while I, with one lad,
support all my thrifty stud on a little barley, etc., the fish-servants
of Hortensius are not to be counted. He has fishermen in fine weather
toiling to procure them food; when the weather is too boisterous for
fishing, then a whole troop of butchers and dealers in provisions send
in their estimates for keeping his _alumni_ fat. Hortensius so looks
after his mullet as to forget his men; a sick slave has less chance of
getting a draught of cold water in a fever than these favoured fish of
being kept cool in their stews in Midsummer.”
The fish often answered to their names when called by their master, or
their keeper. The latter, _nomenclator_, made a very handsome income
from the admiring crowds, who flocked to see the fish perform their
exercises with wagging tails or heads bedecked with rich jewels.[551]
Antonia, to whom the lands and villa of Hortensius descended, even
stripped herself of her earrings to put them on a _muræna_. This lady,
apart from this anecdote, was no ordinary person. We find her passing
from the positive of celebrated renown for her beauty, her virtue, her
chastity (no mean feat in that day!), through the comparative of being
the mother of Germanicus Cæsar and Claudius, and the grandmother of
Caligula (which last, in slang parlance, “wanted a bit of doing!”),
unto the superlative of deathless fame in Pliny’s “Nunquam exspuisse”
(never spat!).[552]
The savage use to which Vedius Pollio put his _vivaria_ can be learnt
from the pages of Pliny[553] and Seneca.[554] A slave, for breaking
a crystal decanter at a banquet given to Augustus, was ordered to be
thrown instantly into a _piscina_, there to be eaten alive by the
nibbling voracious _Murænæ_. Escaping from his guards he threw himself
at the Emperor’s feet, “beseeching nothing else except that he should
die otherwise than as food for fish”[555]. Cæsar moved “novitate
crudelitatis” (he little knew that this was his host’s cheery custom)
commanded the crystals of Pollio to be smashed on the spot, the slave
to be freed, and all the fishponds to be filled up.
As conducive to _la joie de vivre_ of the other slaves, the command was
commendable, for the bite of the _Muræna’s_ serrated teeth, according
to Nicander’s _Theriaca_—that “nullius fidei farrago”—owing to its
mating with the viper, dealt poisonous death and destruction to the
fishermen driven by its pursuit “headlong from their boats,” and was
only curable by a mixture made of ashes from its own burnt head!
So dreaded was this fish—curious is it not, to read, although from
its savage nature no other could inhabit the same _vivarium_, the
many stories of its tameness and docility?—that one of the direst of
imprecations ran that in the under-world your enemy’s lungs should be
mangled by _Murænæ_![556]
In times preceding these infatuated extravagant ages, the purpose
for which _vivaria_ were first created was steadfastly kept in mind
and wonderfully advanced by practical pisciculturists. From being a
mere pond for keeping fish alive till needed for the table, _vivaria_
developed in the course of time into spawning grounds.
The pisciculturists went even farther. They turned lakes and rivers
into natural _vivaria_ by depositing in them not only adult fish,
but the spawn of all such species as are in the habit, although born
at sea, of pushing some distance up estuaries and streams. Columella
instances specially the rivers Velinus, Sabatinus, Ciminus, and
Volsinius as examples of the great success of this experiment in fish
propagation.[557]
Comacchio on the Adriatic, from its extraordinary advantages of
position and of fish-food, can hardly have escaped being utilised for
similar purposes by the Romans. For many centuries, at any rate, its
_valli_ or breeding grounds have been renowned. Ariosto sings its
speciality:
“La Città che in mezzo alle piscose
Paludi del Pô, téme ambe le foci.”
Tasso hands it down as the place where the fish—
“finds itself within a prison swamp
Nor can escape, for that seraglio
Is aye to entrance wide, to exit barred.”
At the present day over twelve hundred tons of fish, eight hundred of
them eels, are annually captured at Comacchio.[558]
* * * * *
Since the above was printed, new and interesting evidence of the
importance of fish, not only as an economic, but also as a hygienic,
factor in the nation’s prosperity has been furnished by Prof. J. A.
Thomson in his lecture before the Royal Institution, January 6, 1921.
He traced a connection between the decline of Greece and a shortage
of little fishes. There was strong reason to believe that one of the
causes for the decay of “the glory that was Greece” was that malaria
was brought into the State.
The little creature, which caused malaria, lived on the mosquito by
whom it was carried. The mosquito spent its larval life in the fresh
waters. Little fish were the enemy of the mosquito—particularly the
fish known as “millions”—which consumed the pest at a great rate.
The professor suggested, therefore, that what had happened in Greece
was that there had not been enough little fish to keep the mosquitos
in check. Because of this, malaria had been brought into the country,
and that plague helped, if it did not cause, the destruction of the
wonderful civilisation of Greece.
FOOTNOTES:
[504] _Fasti_, VI. 239 ff.
[505] Agatharchides, _frag._ 1 _ap._ Athen., VII. 50. In these days of
the Science of Comparative Curiosity and International Meddling the
answer of the Bœotian to a foreigner asking how so singular a victim
and sacrifice originated rings out pleasantly refreshing: “I only know
one thing: it is right to maintain the customs of one’s ancestors, and
it is not right to explain them to foreigners!”
[506] Athen., VIII. 8.
[507] Ælian, XV. 6.
[508] Athen., VII. 50, and Paulus Rhode, _Thynnorum Captura_ (Lipsiæ,
1890), p. 71. Most of the major deities—_e.g._ Diana, Apollo, Mercury,
Juno, Neptune, Ceres, and Venus—claimed a particular sacrificiable fish
or fishes. Sometimes fishes were offered to two or more gods, _e.g._
the mullet to Ceres and Proserpine. Cf. J. G. Stuck, _Sacrorum et
sacrificiorum gentil. descriptio_, ii. p. 72.
[509] ἰχθύων δὲ θύσιμος οὐδεὶς οὐδὲ ἱερεύσιμός ἐστιν.
[510] _Hermes_ (1887), XXII. 86. 100. The reason here stated for the
Eel being sacrificiable was because it could be brought alive to the
altar and its blood poured out on it. Stengel’s argument, especially
in association with his remark that sacrifices of fish were as scarce
as those of game, is not convincing, for why should not other fishes
be kept alive in water till the hour of oblation? The belief in the
sanctity of the Eel pertains even unto our day, for in the spring at
Bergas (between the Dardanelles and Lapsaki) they are or were before
the War inviolate.
[511] _Fasti_, III. 339 ff.
[512] Festus, p. 274, 35 ff. W. Lindsay.
[513] Plutarch, _Symp._, VIII. 8. 4.
[514] _De Lingua Latina_, 6. 20 (in his description of the
_Volcanalia_).
[515] F. Boehm, _De symbolis Pythagoreis_ (Berlin, 1905), p. 19, would
connect the fish-offering of the _Volcanalia_ with the belief that the
soul took the form of a fish. G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus der
Römer_,^2 (München, 1912), p. 229, m. 13.
[516] Cf., however, Keller, _op. cit._, 348.
[517] Pliny, IX. 22, and XXXII. 8. Ælian, VIII. 5; XII. 1. Athen. VIII.
8, Plutarch, _De soll. Anim._ ch. 23. Hesych. _s.v._ Soura.
[518] Pliny, XXXI. 18.
[519] _De Re Rust._, III. 17, 4.
[520] Suetonius, _Augustus_, 96. The subject of oracular fish is dealt
with by A. Bouché-Leclercq, _Histoire de la divination_ (Paris, 1879),
i. p. 151 f., and also by W. R. Halliday, _Greek Divination_, p. 168,
n. 3.
[521] O. Keller, _op. cit._, 347.
[522] The cause, sympathy with their owners, mentioned by Robinson,
_op. cit._, 88-9, hardly recommends itself.
[523] The Greek term, ταρίχη, was applied to _Conserves de viande et
poisson_—but chiefly the latter. Salted fish was a food far commoner
among the Latins than among the Greeks (Daremberg and Saglio).
Sausages—_Isicia_ or _Insicia_—were made from fish as well as meat. Of
both there were, according to Apicius (Bk. II.), many preparations,
those from fish being in great demand.
[524] Nonnius, _op. cit._, p. 155. Apart from fashionable mania, the
_salsamentum_ was used for very practical purposes, _e.g._ as food
for the Athenian soldier on campaign. Cf. Aristoph., _Ach._, 1101, 2.
From the frequent notices and quotations in Athenæus, Euthydemus the
Athenian seems to have been the most prolific author on pickled fish.
On him and his three treatises, see Pauly-Winowa, _Real. Enc._, VI.
1505.
[525] _À propos_ of the fish-trade of Olbia, Koehler (in the _Mém.
de l’Acad. des Sciences de St. Petersburg_, VI^{me} série, tome 1,
p. 347, St. Petersburg, 1832, as quoted by E. H. Minns, _Scythians
and Greeks_, Cambridge, 1913, p. 440) concludes that preserved fish
of every quality, from jars of precious pickle, corresponding to our
caviare or anchovy, to dried lumps answering to our stock-fish were
all sent to Greece, and later to Rome, from the mouths of Dnêpr and
the sea of Azov. As regards some of the small _copper_ coins of Olbia,
Mr. G. F. Hill, _A Handbook of Greek and Roman Coins_ (London, 1899),
p. 3, writes: “If these are coins, they differ from the ordinary
Greek coin only in the fact that, instead of putting a fish type on
a flan of ordinary shape, the whole coin was made in the shape of
a fish. Another explanation is suggested by the fact that a pig of
metal was sometimes called δελφίς. These fish-shaped pieces may be the
degenerate representatives of similar-shaped pigs of bronze.” He refers
to Ardaillon, _Les Mines du Laurin_, p. 111, who compares the French
_saumon_ with the meaning of “a pig of metal.”
[526] In Pitra, _op. cit._, pp. 508-512, will be found a list of 156
coins, gems, etc., illustrating the connection of various fishes
with deities and places. For the coins of Carteia, see A. Heiss,
_Description générale des monnaies antiques de l’Espagne_, Paris, 1870,
p. 331 f., pl. 49, 19-21 (= my Fig. _supra_). The _salsamentum_ of this
town was in special request; its boasted excellence might be perhaps
accounted for by Strabo’s statement that the diet of the Tunnies off
Carteia consisted of acorns which grew in that sea, just as land acorns
with an occasional truffle achieve, according to gourmets, for the
Spanish pig the primacy of hams. Alas! for such conjecture, science
shows that the Tunny throve on _Fucus vesiculosus_, not acorns. Cf.
Keller, _op. cit._ 383.
[527] B. V. Head, _Historia Mumorum_, Oxford, 1911, p. 67: “These
little coins formed the staple of the common currency in the Tarentine
fish-markets, as well as in the rural districts subject to Tarentum,
and even beyond its territories—in Apulia and Samnium for instance.”
[528] Some authorities (Preller, _Griech. Myth._, I. 191) believe the
head to be that of Artemis, not only the protectress of Arethusa, but
also the goddess of rivers and springs, and of the fish therein—one of
her emblems was a fish. Some coins show her or Arethusa’s head with
seaweed plaited in the hair, or the hair plaited in a sort of fish-net
surrounded by little fish. The whole island of Ortygia was absolutely
dedicated to Artemis—no plough could cut a furrow, no net ensnare a
fish, without instantly encountering a sea of troubles. See Keller,
_op. cit._, p. 343. The sacred fish were seen by Diodorus (V. 3) as
late as Octavian’s reign.
[529] For an admirable account of Syracusan coin-types during the
‘fine’ period (413-346 B.C.), see G. F. Hill, _Coins of Ancient Sicily_
(London, 1903), p. 97 ff., with frontispiece and pls. 6-7. On the
widespread representation of the Tunny on vases and coins—Carthaginian,
Pontic, etc.—see Rhode, _op. cit._, pp. 73-77.
[530] See G. F. Hill, _op. cit._, Pl. 7, 13.
[531] L. Siret, _Questions de chronologie et ethnographie ibériques_
(Paris, 1913), Index, _s.v._ ‘Poulpe.’
[532] Cf. Tacitus, _Annals_, XII. 63.
[533] _De Re Rustica_, VIII. 16, “Our ancestors shut up salt-water
fishes also in fresh waters. For that ancient rustic progeny of Romulus
and Numa valued themselves mightily upon this and thought it a great
matter, that, if a rural life were compared with a city life, it did
not come short in any part of riches whatsoever.”
[534] “Orata,” according to Festus, p. 196, 26 ff. Lindsay, “genus
piscis appellatur a colore auri, quod rustici _orum_ dicebant.”
[535] See _ante_, p. 146. If he praise our oysters, he straightly
condemns the pearls from them, as being “small and discoloured;”
wherefore (IX. 57) Julius Cæsar, when he presented a _thorax_ to Venus
Genetrix, had it made of British “pearls,” a very poor requital to a
goddess, who, if Suetonius is to be trusted, had so often stood him in
good stead, both as a distant ancestress, and in other connections!
Some really fine pearls have been found in Scotland and Wales: the best
known of these, got at Conway in the eighteenth century, was presented
to Catherine of Braganza, and is still preserved in the Crown jewels.
Wright, _op. cit._, p. 220.
[536] Pliny, XXXII. 21.
[537] Athen., I. 13; cf. Suidas, _s.v._ ὄστρεα.
[538] Euphron, _incert. fab. frag._ 1, quoted by Athen., I. 13.
[539] Cf. Varro, _De Re Rust._, 3. 12, 1, and Plin., 9. 82.
[540] Petronius, 120, 88, _expelluntur aquæ saxis, mare nascitur arvis_.
[541] Lucullus, enriched by the vast booty captured from Mithridates
and Tigranes, was the first who taught luxury to the Romans (Athen.,
VI. 109). Polybius (31, 24) writes that M. Porcius Cato denounced the
introduction of foreign extravagances into Rome, citing as instances
that for a jar of pickled fish from Pontus 300 _drachmæ_ had been paid,
and that the price of a beautiful boy exceeded that of a field.
[542] _De Re Rustica_, III. 17.
[543] _De Re Rustica_, VIII. 16. Cf. also Juvenal, V. 94 ff.—
“quando omne peractum est
Et iam defecit nostrum mare, dum gula sævit,
Retibus assiduis penitus scrutante macello
Proxima, nec patimur Tyrrhenum crescere piscem,”
and Seneca, _Ep._, 89, 22—
“quorum profunda et insatiabilis gula hinc maria scrutatur, hinc
terras.”
[544] The explanation for this by Nonnius, _op. cit._, p. 75—that the
Greek coasts, from being surrounded on all sides by seas, yielded
ample supplies of fish, while the Romans, “whose seas were not so
near,” were not as fortunate and were compelled to be more instant in
pisciculture—is a statement at the best doubtful, and certainly not
supported by the existence of _vivaria_ in Sicily, lapped on every side
by seas.
[545] The existence of such gigantic craft has been called in question,
but is proved by an inscription from the temple of the Paphian
Aphrodite in Cyprus, which commemorates a builder of an εἰκοσήρης and a
τριακοντήρης (W. Dittenberger, _Orientis Græci Inscriptiones Selectæ_
(Lipziæ, 1903), I. 64, no. 39). See also, L. Whibley, _A Companion to
Greek Studies_ (Cambridge, 1916), p. 584 f. Athen., V. 40-44. Caligula
built two ships for cruising and fishing up and down the Campanian
coast: their poops blazed with jewels. They were fitted up with ample
baths, galleries, and saloons, while a great variety of vines and fruit
trees were cultivated. Suetonius, _Cal._ 37. Divers have discovered
at the bottom of Lake Nemi two imperial house-boats of enormous size,
the timbers of which are decked with bronze reliefs of magnificent
workmanship. See V. Malfatti, _Le navi romane del lago di Nemi_, 1905.
[546] _Op. cit._, p. 246.
[547] Cf. Tibullus, II. 3. 45.
“Claudit et indomitum moles mare, lentus ut intra
Neglegat hibernas piscis adesse minas.”
[548] Pliny, IX. 81.
[549] Plutarch, _De Sol. Anim._, 23.
[550] _De Re Rustica_, III. 17. This abstinence on the part of
Hortensius from eating his “mulli barbati” is the more to be
appreciated, when we remember that, according to Sophron, the savour of
the “barbati” was far pleasanter than that of any other mullet. Athen.,
VII. 126.
[551] Martial, _Ep._, IV. 30, 4.
“Qui norunt dominum manumque lambunt
Illam, qua nihil est in orbe maius.
Quid quod nomen habent et ad magistri
Vocem quisque sui venit citatus?”
and Martial, X. 30, 22.
“Natat ad magistrum delicata muræna,
Nomenculator mugilem citat notum,
Et adesse jussi prodeunt senes mulli.”
Cicero, _Ep. ad Att._, XX. I., “Our leading people think that they
attain unto Heaven if they own in their ponds bearded mullets, who
will come to them to be stroked.” Cf. Lucian (_De Dea Syria_, 45-48).
Ælian, VIII. 4, confirms these statements, and in 12. 30, tells of
a spring in Caria sacred to Zeus, in which were kept eels decked
with earrings and chains of gold, while Pliny, XXXII. 8, writes that
at the Temple of Venus at Hierapolis, of which Lucian speaks as an
eye-witness, “adveniunt pisces exornati auro.” This practice is, and
has been, world-wide. “Fishes though little have long ears,” is an old
Chinese proverb. “In Japan fish are summoned to dinner by melodious
gongs. In India, I have seen them called out of the muddy depths of the
river at Dohlpore by the ringing of a handbell, while carp in Belgium
answer at once to the whistle of the monks who feed them, and in far
away Otaheite, the chiefs have pet eels, whom they whistle to the
surface” (Robinson, _op. cit._, p. 14). Cf. Athen., VIII. 3, “and I
myself and very likely many of you too have seen eels having golden and
silver earrings, taking food from any one who offered it to them.” The
Egyptians similarly adorned their crocodiles with gold earrings. Herod.
2. 69.
[552] VII. 18.
[553] IX. 39.
[554] _De Ira_, III. 40.
[555] For eels devouring the flesh of a corpse, see _Iliad_, 203 and
353.
[556] Aristophanes, _Frogs_, 474 f., Ταρτησία μύραίνα, a great dainty
(Varro, _ap._ Gell., 6. 16. 5), is of course meant to suggest Tartarus.
Contrast with this, the popularity of the fish, as attested by its
frequent mention, especially in Plautus, and by the fact which Helbig
(_Camp. Wandgemälde_ (Leipzig, 1868), Index, p. 496, _s.v._ “Muräne”)
brings out, that on the mural decorations of Pompeii no fish finds more
frequent representation.
[557] _De Re Rustica_, VIII. 16, “Quamobrem non solum piscinas, quas
ipsi construxerant, frequentabant sed etiam quos rerum natura lacus
fecerat convectis marinis seminibus replebant. Et lupos auratasque
procreaverunt ac siqua sint alia piscium genera dulcis undæ tolerantia.”
What fish Columella meant by _Aurata_ is not settled: it is certainly
_not_ the “gold-fish,” as some translate, for they are not sea-fish.
Facciolati, after saying that the name came from the fish having golden
eyebrows, goes on that “some folk deny that he can be identified with
the ‘gilthead’ or ‘dory.’” Perhaps the fish is one of the _Sparidæ_
group, which pass at certain seasons of the year from the Mediterranean
into salt-water fish marshes, as observed by Aristotle, and confirmed
by M. Duhamel. Or can it be the smelt?
Faber, pp. 37, 38, “of fresh-water fishes, twenty-one species, among
them the fresh-water Perch, are also common to the sea: amongst the sea
fishes, the flounder frequents brackish water, and sometimes enters
the rivers: others only occasionally frequent the lagoons and brackish
waters, among them the Gilthead,” a statement incidentally confirmed
by Martial (_Ep._ XIII. 90) in his helluous _pronunciamento_, that
practically the only really good _Aurata_ was that whose haunt was
the Lucrine lake, and whose whole world was its oyster! of which fish
Martial (XIII. 90) seems only appreciative,
“ ... cui solus erit concha Lucrina cibus.”
[558] Faber, _op. cit._, 86. Cf. _Revue Contemporaine_, June 30 and
July 15, 1854, where the fisheries at Comacchio are described at length.