34 ; Neh. iii, 3 ; xii, 39 ; Zeph. i, 10). In addition to these sources, the reservoirs formed in the neighbor- hood of towns nia}^ have been stocked with fish (2 Sam. ii, 13 ; iv, 12 ; Isa. vii, 3 ; xxii, 9, 11 ; Cant, vii, 4, where, however, "fisli" is interpolated in the A.V.). See Food. The most nutritious and common of the fishes which must have filled the Jewish markets were genera of Percadie (perch tribes) ; Seicenidx (mucli re- sembling the perches) ; and particularly the great tribe of the Scomberidie (mackerel), with its numerous gen- era and still more aljundant species, frequenting tlie Mediterranean in prodigious numbers, and mostly ex- cellent for the table ; but being often without percepti- ble scales, they may have been of questionable use to the Hebrews. All the species resort to the deep seas, and foremost of them is the genus Thynnus, our tunny, a fish often mentioned with honor by the ancients, from Aristotle downward ; a specimen taken near Greenock in 1831 was nine feet in length. Its flesh is highly prized, and from its great solidit\' it partakes much of the character of meat. Although repeatedly taken on the English coast, it is really a native of the Mediterranean, where it abounds, not only in Sicilian waters, but, in three or four species, in the Levant. The following complete the catalogue : the Mt/gilidw family (the sea mullets, mugiles, being valuable in ev- ery part of the Mediterranean), the Labridw (or Wrasse of Pennant), and Cyprinidw (carps, particularly abun- dant in the fresh waters of Asia) ; after these may be ranged the genus Mormyi-vs, of which the species, amounting to six or seven, are almost exclusivel)' ten- ants of the Nile and the lake of Tiberias, and held among the most palatable fish which the fresh waters produce. Cat or sheat-fish {Siluridai) are a family of numerous genera, all of which, except the Loricariw, are destitute of a scaly covering, and were consequently unclean to the Hebrews ; though several of them were held bj' the ancient Gentile nations and by some of the modern in high estimation, such as the blackfish, probably the shilbeh {Silurus Shilbe Niloticus) of the Nile, and others. Of salmons (Salmonidte), the Myletes dentex or Ilasselquisti belongs to the most edible fishes of the Egj'ptian river ; there were also Chipeidm (her- rings) and the Gadidre (or cod), these last being pres- ent about Tyre ; Pleuronectes (or flatfish) are found off the Egj'ptian coasts, and eel-shaped genera are bred abundanth' in the lakes of the Delta. A comparison of this list with the enumeration of the ancient Egj-p- tian fish given Iiy Strabo (xvii, 823), or b}' Sir G.Wil- kinson in his Ancient Egyptians (iii, 58), will show us that some of the fish which have to the present day preserved their excellent character as wholesome food (such as some species of the Pircadai [e. g. the "gish- er"], and the Labridce [e. g. the " bulti"], and the Cy- prinidx [e. g. the " benni ;" " the carpe is a dayntous fisshe," wrote old Leonard Maschal in 1514, when he introduced the fish into England]), were the identical diet which the children of Israel "remembered" so in- vidiouslj' at Taberah, when they ungratefully' loathed the manna (Numb, xi, 5). Finally, there are the car- tilaginous orders, where we find the file-fish (genu* Balistes), having a species (/?. vetula) in the waters of the Nile ; and true chondropterygians, containing the sharks, numerous in genera and species, both in the Mediterranean and Red Sea. We notice only Carcha- rius Lamia, the white or raging shark, often found of enormous size off Alexandria, and always attended by several pilot-fish (Naticrates), and the saw-fish (Pristi* antiquorum), most dreaded by the pearl-fishers in the Persian Gulf, and which has been seen in the Red Sea pursuing its prej' even into the surf, with such force and velocity that, on one occasion, half of a fish cut asunder by the saw flew on shore at the feet of an officer while employed in the surveying service. On rays we shall only add that most of the genera are represented by species in either sea, and in particular the sting rays {Trigon) and electric ra3-s (^Torpedo),
FISH
578
FISH
with which we close our general review of the class, although mam- interesting remarks might be subjoin- ed, all tending to clear up existing misconceptions re- specting fishes in general — such as that cetaceans, or the whale tribe, belong to them ; and the misapplica- tion of the term when tortoises and oysters are denom- inated fish; for the error is general, and the Arabs ven include lizards in the appellation. See Zoology.
I'X^ix^v dyovui; idTiv). This epithet ayovoq is applied to the Dead Sea itself by Josephus, War, v, 4 (see Bo- chart, Bieroz. i, 40). — Kitto, s. v. ; Smith, s. v. See Dead Sea.
FISH IN Christian Symbolism. Of all the sym- bols used by the early Christians, none Avas more wide- ly used than that of the fish. It was emploj'ed as a metaphor in the writings of the fathers of the Church,
Ancient Kgyptians curing Fish. Fig. 1, splits them open, a, and removes the entrails, as at 6, 6; 2, takes out tlie back- bone, (/, and salts them from the pot, c; 3 and 4, bring them lu whole, <",/, g.