358 FISHING METHODS 
While there may be doubt whether we possess any Assyrian 
word signifying hooks, there can be none as to their existence 
and their employment. 
From the absence of any, even conjectural, word for or 
representation of a float, we can only infer that ground bait 
fishing was the chief, perhaps the sole, line method in vogue. 
I can find no evidence that the Assyrians availed themselves 
of the spear, the trident, drugs or poison, but as the first two 
figure in Egyptian, Jewish, and Roman records, and appear 
to be the common property of all early peoples, the probability 
is that they were known and used in the Two Rivers. 
The fish of these resembled the fish of the Nile in their 
alleged refusal to rise to a fly, but our soldiers have caught on 
the fly hundreds of “ salmon” of good weight up to 112 lbs. 
One (hand-lined) scaled 170 Ibs., and one (speared) ran up to 
215 Ibs. This ‘‘salmon”’ is a kind of mahseer, the noblest of 
the carp family,! or, according to Mr. Tate Regan, a barbel, 
probably the species Barbus esocinus described by Heckel as 
coming from the Tigris.? 
The second method was by Netting, which to judge from 
its repeated occurrence either as a pursuit or in metaphor 
was universal, and prevailed far more extensively than line 
fishing, especially in Sumeria. The only Sumerian word, 
according to Dr. Langdon, for fishing, ha-dib (one of the oldest 
words in the world for the act or occupation), signifies or is 
akin to a word signifying “to surround,” 7.e. with a net, as 
does the Babylonian term baru. If this be the case, Netting 
probably constituted their universal, possibly their only fishing. 
In the eastern division of Assyria proper lie the main 
tributaries of the Tigris, such as the Zab and the Diyala, 
rising among the Kurdish mountains. As Netting was naturally 
more restricted in this area than in the Persian Gulf, line 
fishing possibly obtained more widely here than in the South. 
At any rate it is from the Sumerian excavations that we 
derive a well-known example of metaphorical Net fishing. 
1 See The Fishing Gazette, January 6, 1917. 
2 See The Field, March 15, 1919. The fish is said to attain a weight of 
ever 300 Ibs. 
