Tuna in Ancient Greece

Daniel B. Levine

(University of Arkansas)

21 March, 2006

American Institute of Wine and Food

New York, NY

Illustration: Thunnus Thunnus.

INTRODUCTION

The ancient peoples of the Mediterranean valued the tuna immensely. From the Pillars of Heracles in the west to the Black Sea in the East, this fish was hunted and consumed in earnest. The ancients delighted in its taste, and profited by its harvest. They wrote about tuna, drew pictures of tuna, and inscribed their images on coins. This delicacy inspired poets and playwrights, attracted the attention of scientists and geographers, and served as sacrificial offerings to the gods themselves.

LOVE OF FISH: OPSOPHAGY

Greeks from the classical period onward were crazy about fish. It was the most preferred dish to accompany their basic grain diet, the favorite relish, or 'opson.' One ancient author (Athenaeus 276e5) writes, 'It is no wonder, my friends, that among all the specially prepared dishes which we call an opson, the fish is the only one which has won its way, on account of its excellent eating qualities, to be called by this name, because people are so mad for this kind of food.' 'We give the name 'relish eaters,' opsophagoi rather to people who gad about among the fishmongers' (276f7).

Aelian's Historical Miscellany records that the ancient people of the island of Rhodes, considered those who are fish-lovers the only real gentlemen, and those who prefer meat to be lesser men:

Now I wish to report to you an opinion held by the Rhodians. In Rhodes, it is said, anyone who looks at the fish in the market and admires them and is much more of an epicure than other people (ka¤ nta t&laqno;n êllvn Ùcofag¤staton) ­ any such person is esteemed by his fellow citizens as a gentleman (w §leuy°rion). But a man who shows a preference for meat (tÚn prÚw tå kr°a époneÊonta) is criticized by the Rhodians as vulgar and gluttonous (w fortikÚn kaÐ gãstrin). Whether they are right in this or mistaken, I shall not deign to discuss. 1.28

And, among the thousands of fish which the Greeks harvested, they prized the tuna mightily. Archestratus of Gela says that as much as eels were valued as the best of all foods, the fattest tuna is so much superior to the most utterly worthless of fish, the so-called 'raven fish' (korakinon, Fr. 20 = Ath. 7.249a). Furthermore, he suggests the eating of Sicilian tuna slices (temachos), and continues:

And if you come to the holy city of famous Byzantion,/ I urge you again to eat a steak of peak-season tuna; for it is very good/and soft.(kleinoË Buzant¤ou eÞw pÒlin ègnÆn,/ ra¤ou fãge moi t°maxow pãlin: ¶sti går §sylÚn/ kaÐ malakÒn.) (Fragment 39 = Athen. 3.116f-17b, tr. Olson/Sens)

ETYMOLOGY OF THUNNOS

The movement of these fish gave the Greeks the notion of the origin of their name. They derived the name tuna (thunnos) from the verb thuo, that means 'to dart, or move quickly,' (thuneo, thuno, thuo; Athen. Deipn. 302b), and Oppian uses the etymology to make a pun when he refers to the 'dashing Tunny' (thunnoi thunontes), as being 'most excellent among fishes for spring and speed' (Oppian Hal. 1.179). Furthermore, a passage in the Deipnosophistai , derives the name of the bonito tuna, Amiai, from the Greek words that reflect their tendency to travel in schools: hama (together) and ienai (to go): 'these fish 'go with' their kind, for it is gregarious.'

THE 'GADFLY': A PLAGUE UPON THE TUNA

The ancients remarked on the parasite they called 'oistros' which attached itself to tuna. This parasite, probably the copepod Brachiella thynni, or Cecrops Latreillii, made a great impression on ancient fish observers. Aristotle gives us the first description of this so-called 'gadfly':

The "gadfly" (oistros) which infests the tunny is found round its fins (pterugia); it is like a scorpion (skorpiois), and about the size of a spider (arakhnes). (Aristotle Hist. Animal. 557a27)

Athenaeus adds that the oistros is a creature like a small maggot (skolekion). Aristotle also tells us that the tuna is worse to eat in the summer, when the oistros plagues it, and better to eat (agathos) in the fall, when it stops suffering from the gadfly (oistron pauetai). Athenaeus repeats this, saying that tunny becomes edible after it is relieved of the oistrus (Ath. Deip. 301e).

Numerous authors, Aristotle included, describe how this parasite is responsible for a gadfly-frenzy that makes both tuna and swordfish leap out of the water, sometimes into ships (Arist. Hist. An. 602a25, Pliny Nat. Hist. 9.54, Oppian Hal. 2.506-532 ). Oppian's epic poem on fish provides the most picturesque description:

The Tunny and the Sword-fish are ever attended and companioned by a plague (pma), which they can never turn away or escape: a fierce gadfly (êgrion ostron) which infests their fins and which, when the burning Dog-star is newly risen, fixes in them the swift might of its bitter sting (k°ntrou), and with sharp assault stirs them to grievous madness (xalepØn dÉ §pÐ lÊssan Ùr¤nei), making them drunk with pain (yvrÆjaw ÙdÊnsin). With the lash of frenzy it drives them to dance (foital¢ mãstigi xoreu°men) against their will; maddened (memhnÒtew) by the cruel blow they rush and now here, now there ride over the waves, possessed by pain unending (énÆnuton êlgow ¶xontew). Often also they leap into well-beaked ships, driven by the stress of their distemper; and often they leap forth from the sea and rush writhing upon the land, and exchange their weary agonies for death; so dire pain is heavy upon them and abates not This pain (êlgow) the fishes suffer even as do the cattle. (Oppian Hal. 2.506-532)

EATING TUNA

Greeks valued tuna in many forms. They served it by the grilled slice (temakhos), and also dried, salted, and pickled it, making the important staple tarikhos (preserved fish), which was shipped throughout the Mediterranean. Doug Olson notes that 'Chunks of salt fish dating to the second half of the 5th century have been recovered in excavations at Korinth.' [Cf. Williams, Hesperia 48 (1979) 117-118, and pl. 46.] (S. Douglas Olson, Archestratus of Gela, p. 164).

We know a few things about ancient preparation of tuna for eating. One of the earliest references to its attractive flavor comes from the sixth-century BCE iambic poet Hipponax of Ephesus, who wrote a poem about a man who literally wasted his life by luxuriously overindulging in tuna with a savory sauce:

For one of them, dining at his ease and lavishly (<suxª, =Êdhn) every day on tuna and savory sauce (mussvtÒn) like a eunuch from Lampsacus, ate up his inheritance; as a result he has to dig a rocky hillside, munching on cheap figs and coarse barley bread, fodder for slaves (doÊlion xÒrton). (Hipponax Fr. 26, = Athen. Deipn. 7.304)

Note that the eunuch to whom Hipponax compares this gourmand hailed from Lampsacus, a wealthy town near Troy at the entrance to the Hellespont, just southwest of Byzantium. There is a reason for this.

This savory sauce, mussvtÒw greatly complemented the tuna. Sometimes translated as 'olio,' mussotos was a mess of cheese, honey, and garlic beaten together, a type of mince meat (LSJ). One ancient Greek food writer says the following about this delicious combination:

And then from the sea there is tuna, no mean food (oÈ kakÚn br&laqno;ma), but one that stands out among all fish in a savory sauce (§mprepØw §n mussvt") (Ananius, in Athen. Deipn. 7.282b)

Greeks especially esteemed the belly-pieces of tuna (ta hypogastria, Athen. Deipn. 7.302f). Other edible pieces include the shoulders, or 'keys' (kleides = claviculae), and the head (Athen. Deipn. 303a). Two lost comedies by Antiphanes apparently praised the 'middle slice of the very best Byzantine tunny' and the 'tail-cut' (to ouraion) of the female tuna (Athen. Deipn. 304a). The epicure Archestratus provides a recipe for this tail cut, praising it as being 'like unto the immortal gods in nature and appearance':

And have a tail-cut from the she-tunny ­the large she-tunny, I repeat, whose mother-city is Byzantium. Slice it and roast it all rightly, sprinkling just a little salt, and buttering it with oil. Eat the slices hot, dipping them into a pungent brine (drimeian es halmen); they are nice even if you want to eat them without sauce (literally: dry), like the deathless gods in form and stature. But if you serve it sprinkled with vinegar, it is ruined. (Fr. 38 = Athen. Deipn. 7.303e)

This is not our only ancient recipe for tuna. Archestratus of Sicilian Gela's work on gastronomy --in dacytlic hexameter verse ­ also includes the following advice on cooking the Amia, or Bonito, which, according to Hikesios, are well-flavored and tender (eukhulous, hapalas):

As for the amia, prepare that in the autumn, when the Pleiad is setting, and in any way you like. Why need I recite it for you word for word? For you cannot not possibly spoil it even if you want to. Still, if you insist, dear Moschus, on being instructed here is the best way to dress that fish, wrap it in fig-leaves with a very little marjoram (origanoi). No cheese, no nonsense! Just place it tenderly in fig-leaves and tie them on top with a string; then push it under hot ashes, thinking wisely of the time when it is done, and don't burn it! Let it come to you from lovely (erateinou) Byzantium if you desire the best, yet you will get what is good even if it is caught somewhere near this place here. But it is poorer (kheiron) the farther you go from the Hellespont (near Byzantium), and if you journey over the glorious courses of the briny Aegean main, it is no longer the same, but utterly belies my earlier praise (kataiskhunei ton prosthen epainon). (Athenaeus 7. 278a-d)

We shall return to the subject of the excellence of the tuna in the Hellespont, near Byzantium.

MIGRATION

Tuna, like other fish, got around. They migrated, and great shoals of tuna used to go in and out of the Black Sea, which the Greeks called the Pontus. Aristotle in the fourth century BCE wrote:

Tunnies, pelamyds and bonitos enter the Pontus in spring and spend the summer there, and so do practically the majority of the shoaling and gregarious fishes (hoi pleistoi ton rhuadon kai agelaion ikhthuon). (Aristotle, Hist. An. 598a20)

Aristotle and others carefully observed these migrations in the narrow channels of the Propontus near Byzantium, and made a strange observation about tuna's eyesight as a result:

The tunny swim inwards while keeping to the left shore; some say they do this because they see more sharply (oxuteron) with the right eye, not having sharp sight by nature (ouk oxu blepontes). (Aristotle, Hist. An. 598b19)

Aelian cites a tragedy by Aeschylus that mentions this curious fact about tuna eyes:

And that they see with one eye and not with the other is admitted by Aeschylus when he says [fr. 308N]: 'Casting his left eye askance like a tunny.'(tÚ skaiÚn mma parabaln yÊnnou d¤khn.) And they pass into the Euxine, keeping the land on their right, on which side in fact they look out. Contrariwise when issuing from the Euxine they swim along the opposite shore and hug the land, taking the utmost precaution to safeguard their life by means of the eye which sees. (Aelian On Animals 9.42.)

Oppian's epic on fishing speaks more poetically of the tuna migration from the Atlantic past Spain, France, Italy, and Sicily:

The breed of Tunnies comes from the spacious Ocean, and they travel into the regions of our sea when they lust after the frenzy of mating in spring. First the Iberians who plume themselves upon their might capture them within the Iberian brine; next by the mouth of the Rhone the Celts and the ancient inhabitants of Phocaea (Massalia) hunt them; and thirdly those who are dwellers in the Trinacrian isle (Sicily) and by the waves of the Tyrrhenian sea. Thence in the unmeasured deeps they scatter this way or that and travel over all the sea. Abundant and wondrous is the spoil for fishermen when the host of Tunnies set forth in spring. (Oppian Hal. 3.620ff.)

 

HUNTING TUNA

The Chorus of Knights in Aristophanes' fifth-century BCE comedy of the same name makes fun of the greed of the Athenian politician Cleon:

As a furious torrent you have overthrown our city; your outcries have deafened Athens and, posted upon a high rock, you have lain in wait for the tribute moneys as the fisherman does for the tunny-fish (thunnoskopon: literally, 'acting as a tunascope' 'a watcher for tuna'). (Aristophanes, Knights 303-312)

Aristophanes' audience would have understood this as a reference to the tunnoskopoi, men who went to high bluffs or mounted tall 'tuna towers' to watch for the migrating tuna and direct the operations of the boats which would set out on the hunt.

We possess a great deal of information available on how Greeks hunted and harvested the tuna. They carefully observed their migrations, in order to be able to trap them in the most efficient ways. The geographer Strabo writes of the migration of young tuna from their birthplace in the northern reaches of the Black Sea, and their journey to Byzantium, where they must pass through the narrow channel to reach the sea beyond. Their journey is treacherous because of the fishermen who know exactly when and where they will pass. He describes vividly their trip and their capture at Byzantium, explaining how they provide riches for the Byzantines:

The Horn, which is close to the Byzantians' city wall, is an inlet extending about 60 stadia towards the west. It resembles a stag's horn, being split into several inlets, branches as it were. Into these the young tunny (pelamydes) stray, and are then easily caught because of their number and the force of the following current and the narrowness of the inlets; they are so tightly confined that they are even caught by hand. These creatures originate in the marshes of Maiotis [Azov], and, getting a little bigger, escape through its mouth [the Straits of Kerch] in shoals, and are swept along the Asian coast to Trapezous and Pharnakeia. That is where the tunny fishery begins, though it is not a major activity, because they have not yet reached full size. As they pass Sinope they are more ready for catching and for salting. When they have reached the Kyaneai and entered the strait, a certain white rock on the Kalkhedonian side so frightens them that they cross to the opposite side, and there the current takes them: and the geography at that point is such as to steer the current towards Byzantion and its Horn, and so they are naturally driven there, providing the Byzantians and the Roman people with a considerable income. (Strabo, Geography 7.6.2)

Indeed, an inscription found in the area of the narrow straits that connect the Black Sea to the Aegean, describing large-scale seine and salt-fish operations there confirms Strabo's observations. Ephraim Lytle has recently described this inscription (I. Parion 5: = Die Inschriften von Parion (IK 25, 1983), which was set up 'by fishermen who had leased the rights to a tuna tower, or lookout, at a place known locally as Neilaion.' He argues that 'the hierarchically arranged list of individuals and duties corresponds to a single large-scale seine and salt-fish operation,' containing named individual fishermen and their duties. Furthermore, he notes that

A second inscription, I.Parion 6, although very fragmentary, appears to attest the existence of an identically structured operation at a different location, and additional epigraphic evidence suggests the existence of similar operations in various locations stretching from the Sea of Marmora to the Saronic Gulf to the Cyclades. (T. E. Lytle, 2006: http://www.apaclassics.org/AnnualMeeting/06mtg/abstracts/Lytle.pdf)

Ancient descriptions of these tuna fishing operations give us a vivid image of the process. Since the fish was so large, Aelian says that tuna fishing was like 'whaling', or "Big Fishing" (keteian), and that in Italy and Sicily there were "big fish tackle storehouses" (ketothereia). His description of the Tuna Towers used in the Propontis is vivid and detailed:

Now the inhabitants of the whole of that country know exactly of the coming of the Tunny, and at that season of the year (mid July) the fish arrive, and much gear has been got ready to deal with them, boats and nets and a high lookout place (skopiå ÍchlÆ). This lookout place is fixed on some beach and stands where there is a wide, uninterrupted view.

Two high pine-trunks held apart by wide balks of timber, are set up; the latter are interwoven in the structure at short intervals and are of great assistance to the watchman in mounting to the top. Each of the boats has six young men, strong rowers, on either side. The nets are of considerable length; they are not too light and so far from being kept floating by corks are actually weighted with lead, and these fish swim into them in shoals (éyrÒai).

And when the spring begins to shine and the breezes are blowing softly and the air is bright and as it were smiling and the waves are at rest and the sea smooth, the watcher ( skopÒw), whose mysterious skill and naturally sharp sight enable him to see the fish, announces to the fishermen the quarter from which they are coming; if on the one hand the men ought to spread their nets near the shore, he instructs them accordingly; but if closer in, like a general he gives the signal, or like a conductor, the keynote (µ xorol°kthw tÚ §ndÒsimon). And frequently he will tell the total number of fish and not be off the mark.

And this is what happens. When the company of Tunnies makes for the open sea the man in the lookout who has an accurate knowledge of their ways shouts at the top of his voice telling the men to give chase in that direction and to row straight for the open sea. And the men after fastening to one of the pines supporting the lookout a very long rope attached to the nets, then proceed to row their boats in close order and in column, keeping near to one another, because, you see, the net is distributed between each boat. And the first boat drops its portion of the net and turns back; then the second does the same, then the third, and the fourth has to let go its portion. But the rowers in the fifth boat delay, for they must not let go yet. Then the others row in different directions and haul their part of the net, and then pause. Now the tunny are sluggish and incapable of any actions that involves daring, and they remain huddled together and quite still. Sot he rowers, as thought it were a captured city, take captive ­ as a poet might say ­ the population of fishes. (Aelian On Animals 15.5)

Oppian preserves an account of the operation, which does not make use of an artificial tower, but rather, as in Aristophanes, a high point above the sea:

There first a skilful Tunny-watcher (yunnoskÒpow) ascends a steep high hill, who remarks the various shoals, their kind and size, and informs his comrades. Then straightway all the nets are set forth in the waves like a city, and the net has its gate warders and gates withal and inner courts. And swiftly the Tunnies speed on in line, like ranks of men marching tribe by tribe ­ these younger, those older, those in the mid season of their age. Without end they pour within the nets, so long as they desire and as the net can receive the throng of them; and rich and excellent is the spoil.

(Oppian Hal. 3.620- 648)

Oppian preserves other accounts of catching tunny, including a description of how Thracians in the Black Sea cruelly harvested young pelamyds (yearlings) by dropping heavy logs studded with sharp metal protrusions into the young fishes' habitat which brought them up skewered in many and bizarre ways. His account has the quality of an epic battle scene:

The tribes of the Pelamyds are by birth from the Euxine sea and are the offspring of the female Tunny. For these gather by the mouth of the Maeotian Lake (Sea of Azov) where it meets the sea, and there amid the wet reed-beds they bethink them of the painful travail of birth. And such of their eggs as they find they eat as they hurry along, but such as remain among the reeds and rushes give birth in due season to the shoals of the Pelamyds. These when first they skim the waves and make essay of traveling hasten to voyage in alien seas, and, tiny though they be, will not abide where they were born. There is a tract of the Thracian sea which, as men say, is the deepest in all the demesne of Poseidon: wherefore also it is called the Black Gulf (the Gulf on which Ainos is situated, lying to the W. of the Thracian Chersonese). Thereon no over-fierce or violent winds make assault, and in it are coverts under water, cavernous, muddy, beyond thought, in which grow abundantly such things as provide food for tiny fishes. There are the first paths of the new-born swarms of Pelamyds; since beyond all other creatures of the sea they dread the stormy onset of winter ­ for winter dulls the light of their eyes. And there in the spacious loins of the sea they linger idly and grow in size while they await the sweet spring; and there also they mate and fulfill their desire (·merow eÈnw). But when they are full of roe they hasten to travel back tot heir native wave where they put from them the travail of their belly. (530)

These the Thracians who dwell above the deep expanse of the Black Gulf capture in the unkindly season of winter by a cruel and unpleasant form of fishing (yÆrhn érgal°hn kaÐ éterp°a) under the bloody law of war and savage doom of death (yesmÚn ÍfÉ aþmatÒenta kaÐ êgrion ason Ùl°yrou). They have a stout log, not long but as thick as may be, about a cubit in length. On the end of it are put abundant lead and many three-pronged spears set close together; and about it runs a well-twisted cable exceeding long. Sailing up in a boat to where the gulf is deepest, mightily they launch into the murky deep the pine-log's stubborn strength. Straightway with swift rush, weighed down by lead and iron, it speeds to the nether foundations of the sea, where it strikes upon the weak Pelamyds huddling in the mud and kills and transfixes as many as it reaches of the hapless crowd. And the fishermen swiftly draw them up, impaled upon the bronze and struggling pitifully under the iron torture (sidhrd¤w ÙdÊnsin). Beholding them even a stone-hearted man (yrasukãrdiow) would pity (oÞkte¤rai) them for their unhappy capture and death. For the spear-point has entered the flanks of one, the swift shaft has transfixed the head of another; one is wounded over the tail, the groin of this, the back of that is victim of the bitter warfare (ßle drimÁw êrhw), and yet another is pierced in the midst of the belly. As, when the mellay of battle is decided, their comrades take up the slain out of the dust ad blood, and array them for the fiery bed, lamenting; and many and various are the wounds on the bodies of the dead and every sort of warlike stroke is there; even so on the Pelamyds wounds show everywhere ­ an image of war but welcome to the fishers (e¦dolon pol°moio, f¤lon ge m¢n éspalieËsin). (Oppian Hal. 4.504-561)

Oppian includes another account of more humane ways of catching the pelamyd tuna, with boats and nets, without the use of the thunnoskopoi:

Others again take the tribes of the feeble Pelamyds with light nets. For always in the darkness, whatever falls upon the sea, they are afraid and they have a horror of the night and in the night they are captured as they flee in terror through the deep. The fishers set up very light nets of buoyant flax and wheel in a circle round about while they violently strike the surface of the sea with their oars and make a din with sweeping blow of poles. At the flashing of the swift oars and the noise the fishes bound in terror and rush into the bosom of the net which stands at rest, thinking it to be a shelter; foolish fishes (nÆpiai) which, frightened by a noise, enter the gates of doom.

Then the fishers on either side hasten with the ropes to draw the net ashore. And, when they see the moving rope, the fish, in vain terror, huddle and cower together and are coiled in a mass. Then would the fisher offer many prayers to the gods of hunting that nothing may leap out of the net nor anything make a move and show the way; for if the Pelamyds see such a thing, speedily they all bound over the light net into the deep and leave the fishing fruitless. But if none of the sea-roaming gods be angry with the fishermen, then often even when the fishes are haled out of the sea upon the solid shore they will not leave the net but cling to it, afraid even of the eddying rope itself. Even so in the woods the hunters of the hill take the timorous deer by happy hunting craft. (Oppian Hal. 562-587)

TUNA AND THE GODS

The prayers of the fishermen at the precarious moment when the tuna have been caught but not yet brought out of the net remind us that the whole operation was fraught with uncertainty. Aelian's account of Black Sea tuna operations also explains why the fishermen pray to Poseidon "the averter of disaster" (alexikakos) at the crucial moment when they remove the fish from the nets:

When Tunny have been caught by fishermen of the Euxine (and I might add off Sicily also) when they are safely enmeshed in the net, then is the time when everybody prays to Poseidon the Averter of Disaster (élej¤kakow) it is worthwhile to explain what induced them to attach the name 'Averter of Disaster' to the god. They pray to the brother of Zeus, the Lord of the Sea, that neither swordfish nor dolphin may come as fellow-traveler (sun°mporow) with the shoal of Tunny. At any rate your noble sword-fish has many a time cut through the net and allowed the whole company to break through and go free. The dolphin also is the net's enemy, for it is skilful at gnawing its way out. (Aelian On Animals 15.6)

Just as Simon is the patron saint of fishermen and St. Zeno is the patron saint of fish hooks, so Poseidon was the Greek god who received the prayers of fishermen. The second-century CE traveler Pausanias tells of how the people of Corfu came to dedicate a giant statue of a bull to Poseidon at Delphi ­ as the result of a giant catch of tuna:

On entering the enclosure [at Delphi] you come to a bronze bull, a votive offering of the Corcyraeans made by Theopropus of Aegina. The story is that in Corcyra a bull, leaving the cows, would go down from the pasture and bellow on the shore. As the same thing happened every day, the herdsman went down to the sea and saw a countless number of tunny-fish.

He reported the matter to the Corcyraeans, who, finding their labour lost in trying to catch the tunnies, sent envoys to Delphi. So they sacrificed the bull to Poseidon, and straightway after the sacrifice they caught the fish, and dedicated their offerings at Olympia and at Delphi with a tithe of their catch. (Pausanias Description of Greece 10.9.3)

This story reminds us how lucrative the hunting of this fish could be, and how much the Greeks attributed to the divine in their successful pursuit of the tuna. Athenaeus provides some valuable information on the actual tuna sacrifice to Poseidon, and of dried fish which were offered to a local hero. He cites (7.303b) Antigonus of Carystos, who had said in his treatise On Diction that a tunny is sacrificed (thuesthai) to Poseidon. Mammals were the preferred sacrifice for the Olympian deities, due to their large supply of blood. Tuna, therefore, because of the fact that they have an abundant amount of blood, were acceptable sacrifices to Poseidon (see The Cuisine of Sacrifice Among the Greeks, ed. Marcel Detienne and Jean-Pierre Vernant. 1989. U. Chicago Press, Ch. 3: p. 127: 'The Blood of a Tuna'). Athenaeus cites Agatharchides, who wrote that

the Boeotians sacrifice eels which are of surpassing size, putting wreaths on them, saying prayers over them, and casting barley-corns on them as on any other sacrificial victim; and to the foreigner who was utterly puzzled at the strangeness of this custom and asked the reason, the Boeotian declared that he knew only one answer, and he would reply that one should observe ancestral customs (ta progonika nomima), and it was not his business to justify them to other men. (Athen. Deipn. 297d)

Further, Athenaeus cites Antigonus of Carystus, who wrote that

the people of Halae, when they celebrate a festival to Poseidon in the tunny season (hupo ten ton thunnon horan), offer to the god in the event of a good catch the first tunny caught; and this offering is called a thynnaion (tunny offering). (Athen. Deipn. 7. 297e)

In addition to offering fresh tuna to the gods, there is evidence that at Phaselis the inhabitants offered preserved fish (tarikhos) to their local hero as a regular part of his worship. The founderof the colony Lacius, met the shepherd Cylabras, and asked him which he preferred as payment for the area: either barley-meal or smoked fish (e alphita e tarikhous). The shepherd, perhaps because he was far from the sea, chose the smoked fish (tous tarikhous). Ever after, then, the Phaselites annually sacrifice smoked fish (tarikhon thuousi) to Cylabras, honoring him as a hero (Athen. Deipn. 298c).

IMAGES OF TUNA

It is not surprising that the areas where tuna fishing was most common, the Pillars of Heracles (Strait of Gibraltar) and the Propontis (entrance to the Black Sea) paid tribute to their natural resource by putting images of the fish upon their coinage, thus bragging of their fishing wealth. The tuna became their badge. The best examples come from Gades (Gadir) in the west, and Cyzicus in the east.

The Punic people of Gades in Spain, traditionally a settlement from Phoenician Tyre, from an early date minted their own coins, with the head of Melqart (the Phoenician Heracles) on the obverse, and images of tuna on the reverse. These silver coins date from the second and first centuries BCE (illustrations).

The Greek state of Cyzicus in the Propontis, however, holds the title of the king of tuna coinage.