Note 441 — Chapter XIII · AUSONIUS—SALMO, SALAR AND FARIO—FIRST MENTION OF THE PIKE

IX. 32. “In Aquitania salmo fluvialis marinis omnibus prefertur.” To make this clear piscibus should be understood after omnibus. The salmon is the fish most frequently found in the débris of the French caves, many of which are in Aquitania, so Palæolithic and Plinian man at any rate ate tooth to tooth in their preference. See Introduction. It is somewhat amazing, considering their opsophagy and the excellence of the fish, that down to 500 a.d. no Greek, and no Latin writer, except Pliny, Ausonius, and Sidonius, Ep. II. 2, mentions the Salmonidæ. I cannot forgo Ausonius’s epithet—mouth-filling yet appropriate—for us, who dwell in “this blessed Isle, this England,” Aquilonigenasque Britannos.