THE GEEMAN CARP IN THE UNITED STATES. 537 



THE CARP IN EUROPE. 



The little that is known of the early history of the carp is given, 

 with slight variation, in nearly all works which treat of the fish, and 

 as 1 have nothing- to add I shall here give merely a brief sunimar}'. 

 There seems to be a general agreement that carp were indigenous to 

 the temperate portions of Asia; and they had probably spread into 

 southeastern Europe before the Christian era. Aristotle speaks of it 

 as '"a river fish without a tongue, but having a fleshy roof to its 

 mouth; as producing eggs five or six times a year, especially under 

 the inliuence of the stars; as having eggs about the size of millet seed; 

 and as being occasionally struck by the dog-star when swimming near 

 the surface" (Houghton, 1879, p. 15). It is also mentioned by a num- 

 ber of other writers of earl}^ times and is spoken of as an excellent 

 article of food. 



The carp probably came into western Europe by easy stages. Hes- 

 sel states that its culture in xlustria can be traced back as far as the 

 year 1227, and it is claimed to have been introduced into Germany and 

 France two or three decades later (1258). The extensive ponds at 

 Wittingau, in Bohemia, were begun as early as 1307. Carp culture 

 was carried on especially in connection with monasteries and on a 

 number of large estates, and has come to be an important commercial 

 industry, especiallj^ in Austria-Hungary and Prussia. It is said that 

 an acre of water suitable for carp culture will rent for as much as an 

 acre of land. The fish's range has gradually extended in Europe, 

 until now it is found over practically the whole of the continent from 

 Italy to Sweden and Norway, and from France and the British Isles 

 to Russia and the boundaries of eastern Siberia. It does not do so 

 well, however, and is little cultivated, in the more northern portions 

 of its range, such as Scotland, Sweden, Norway, Finland, etc, 



Peyrer (1876, p. 615) states that in Austria the "Danube carp" 

 was once a favorite and cheap food of the common people, but that 

 its numbers have become greatl}' decreased. A writer (Anonymous, 

 1880) whose paper has been translated in the Report of the United 

 States Fish Commission for 1878, and Veckenstedt (1880) have given 

 good descriptions of the carp fisheries of the Peitz Lakes in Nether 

 Lusatia, some 60 to 80 miles to the southeast of Berlin. There are 

 some 76 of these lakes, which are a roj^al domain and are rented to a 

 private individual at an annual return equivalent to 112,870. The 

 ponds are drawn in October, and this is the occasion for a general 

 holiday in the region. The drawing ofl' of the water is begun three 

 weeks beforehand, and when the fish have congregated in the deeper 

 places they are taken by means of large drag-nets, or seines, capable of 

 holding 5,000 pounds of fish. At Cottbus, a near-by city, meets the 

 so-called "Carp Exchange," composed of buyers from the large firms 

 in Halle, Leipzig, Dresden, Magdeburg, Posen, Berlin, etc. The 



