Note 2792 — BOOK IX. THE NATURAL HISTORY OF FISHES. (continued 2)

This name, Cuvier says, appears so rarely in the ancient writers, that it is difficult to ascertain its exact signification. The moderns, he says, have pretty generally agreed to give it to the carp, but without any good and sufficient foundation. It was a lake or river fish, which, as Aristotle says, Hist. Anim. B. vi. c. 14, deposited its eggs five or six times in the year, and which had a palate so fleshy, that it might almost be mistaken for a tongue, B. iv. c. 8, characteristics that appear well suited to the carp. But then, on the other hand, Oppian mentions it, Halieut. B. i., as a shore fish, implying apparently that it belonged to the sea; and Pliny himself, in c. 25 of the present Book, does the same, by his words, “hoc et in mari accidere cyprino.” The words “in mari,” however, he has added, of his own accord, to the account which he has derived from Aristotle.