130 ANGLING LITERATURE 



CHAPTER VI. 



Angling Literature connected with. Heraldry, Architecture, 

 Ancient Coins, &c. &c. 



IN the science or art of Heraldry, fish occupy a con- 

 spicuous station. In fact the subject is too vast for us to 

 do anything but merely allude to it in a very cursory 

 manner. Though the chief portion of armorial ensigns 

 were originally connected with, or arose out of the military 

 service of the feudal system ; yet the different modes of 

 taking fish by the spear, the net, or the hook, are shown 

 to have been indicated in the armorial emblems of those 

 Lords of Manors who derived revenues from the produce 

 of fisheries. 



The most early known device of fish, the Zodiacal sign, 

 is emblematical of the fishery of the Nile, commencing in 

 the month of February, about the period of the year when 

 the sun enters Pisces, which was considered the best season 

 for taking fish. 



The sign of Pisces, according to French heraldic commen- 

 tators, is composed of dolphins, which the goddess Yenus 

 placed in the Zodiac. In the most celebrated statue of the 

 goddess at Florence, she is represented with a dolphin at her 

 feet, to indicate her origin from the sea. The dolphin, in 

 mythology, was sacred to Apollo, and is represented on a 

 tripod in the reverse of a medal struck in the reign of 

 Yitellius. The employment of this fish as a poetical re- 



