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goons, lakes and rivers; and the number of documents, edicts, &c, 

 some of special historical value, on the subject, collected, is very 

 great. Professor Targioni Tozzetti published besides a condensed, 

 but yet lengthy, report on Italian Fisheries, as an Introduction 

 to the Official Catalogue of the Italian section at the Berlin In- 

 ternational Fisheries Exhibition in 1880 (Esposizione intemazio- 

 nale di Pesca in Berlino. Sezione Italiana. Catalogo degli Espo- 

 sitori e delle cose esposte, pp. xvii.-cxxxvi. Firenze, 1880). Be- 

 sides, different reports on special fisheries have been published 

 from time to time by Government. From these different sour- 

 ces I have collected much information, without which my task 

 would have been no easy one. 



II. Fishery Legislation, Past and Present. — As a natural 

 consequence of her long political division, few countries, up to 

 quite a recent date, presented such a varied and large amount 

 of edicts, laws and regulations relating to fishery, some dating 

 back to the earlier part of the Middle Ages, as Italy. A large 

 series of big volumes would be required to collect the documents 

 relating to past Italian fishery legislation, and a varied and sin- 

 gular collection it would prove, interesting besides as bringing 

 down to our days some of the piscatorial traditions of the ancient 

 Greeks and Romans, curious from a linguistic point of view as 

 a meddley of corrupt Latin, mediaeval Italian, Spanish and local 

 dialects. I may quote amongst the more remarkable of such 

 documents the innumerable decrees of the Republic of Venice, 

 relating to fishery and pisciculture, in the lagoons and valli. 

 One of the earliest, bears the date 13th August, 1314; and the 

 curious Red Book (Libro Bosso), regulating to the smallest de- 

 tails all fishery matters of the inner sea (Mare piccolo) of Ta- 

 ranto, which dates positively further back than the fourteenth 

 century. Many such documents were originally emanated to 

 establish feudal rights, which afterwards became the heirlooms 

 of municipalities or devolved to the State. From the earliest 

 periods of any social status, piscatorial and maritime matters 

 have been much mixed up together, and fishermen and sailors 

 regulated by identical laws; on regaining her liberty and com- 

 pleting her unity, Italy sought in the first place to render as 



