Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/513

and tragum, which is found in the ancient Glossaries and in Isidore of Seville^[1].

We find mention of the sean more especially for the capture of the tunny and of the pelamys, which were the two principal kinds of fish caught in the Mediterranean. Lucian speaks of the tunny-sean^[2], which was probably the largest net of the kind, and he relates the circumstance of a tunny escaping from its bag or bosom^[3]. The sean is thrice mentioned in the Epistles of Alciphron (l. c. and lib. i. epp. 17, 18.), and in the two latter passages, as used for catching tunnies and pelamides. We read also of a dolphin ([Greek: delphis]) approaching the sean^[4]; but this might be by accident. It was not, we apprehend, employed to catch dolphins.

In the following passage of the Odyssey (xxii. 384-387) we have a description of the use of a sean in a small bay, having a sandy shore at its extremity, and consequently most suitable for the employment of this kind of net:

[Greek: Hôst' ichthyas, housth' haliêes
Koilon es aigialon poliês ektosthe thalassês
Diktyô exerysan polyôpô; hoi de te pantes
Kymath' halos potheontes epi psamathoisi kechyntai.]

The poet here compares Penelope's suitors, who lie slain upon the ground, to fishes, "which the fishermen by means of a netcorresponds exactly to jactus in Latin, and that the drawing of the net into a circle is clearly indicated: [Greek: bolon ichthyôn pantas en kyklô sagêneusos].—Vita Mosis, tom. ii. p. 95. ed. Mangey.]—Epist. Saturn. tom. iii. p. 406. ed. Reitz.]—Timon, § 22. tom. i. p. 136.]—Ælian, H. A. xi. c. 12. In this chapter the same net is twice called by the common name, [Greek: diktyon].]

1. Tragum genus retis, ab eo quod trahatur nuncupatum: ipsum est et verriculum. Verrere enim trahere est.—Orig. xix. 5. The Latin name verriculum occurs in a passage of Valerius Maximus, which is also remarkable for a reference to the Ionian fisheries, and for the use of the word jactus, literally, a throw, corresponding to that which the Cornish men denominate, a hawl of fish. A piscatoribus in Milesia regione verriculum trahentibus quidam jactum emerat.—Memor. lib. iv. cap. 1. We introduce here an expression of Philo, in which we may remark that [Greek: bolos ichthyôn
2. [Greek: Sagênê thynneutikê.
3. [Greek: Ho thynnos ek mychou tês sagênês diephygen.
4. [Greek: Ouk eti plêsiazei tê sagênê.