THE AMERICAN LOBSTER. 
7 
of “the small astaci, which are bred in the rivers” 1 showing that the reference is 
undoubtedly to the crayfish. 
Athemeus frequently mentions the Astacus in the third book of The Deipnosopli- 
ists, where, as in the passage quoted below, he undoubtedly had in mind the lobster. 
This is from a famous poem of Archest ratus, wherein, as Athemeus remarks, lie never 
once mentions the crab by the name of -/.dpaftoq, yet does speak of the dirraxu 
But passing our trifles, buy an astacus, 
Which has long hands and heavy, too, but feet 
Of delicate smallness, and which slowly walks 
Over the earth’s face. A goodly troop there are 
Of such, and those of finest flavor where 
The isles of Lipara do gem the ocean : 
And many lie deep in the broad Hellespont. 
(The Deipnosophists ; Bk. m, tr. by C. D. Yonge, 1854.) 
Athemeus then quotes from another author, Epicharmus, to show that the adray.oq 
mentioned by Archestratus is the same as the xdpa/Jo?: 
There are astaci and colybdieme, both equipped 
With little feet and long hands, both coming under 
The name of k apa(io<;. 
The English word lobster is from the old English lopystre , 2 which is probably a 
corruption of the Latin locusta — English, locust — a name used by Pliny in speaking of 
the lobster in his Natural History. Thus, in the ninth book, he says: “The lobsters, 
being of that kind which want blood, are protected by a weak shell.” 3 In the next 
section of the same chapter there is a sentence, 4 5 6 in which the astaci are mentioned as 
one of the genera of crabs. It is possible that lobsters are here referred to, but the 
meaning is doubtful. 
Gesner, whose remarkable History of Animals was published at Zurich between 
1551 and 1587, speaks of the lobster under the Aristotlean name of Astacus, and adds 
a very interesting synonymy. He says: 
The English call the Astacus a creuyse of the sea/ 1 for the lopstar of the English is the locust, not 
the astacus; although Eliot in different places has translated astacus, locust, and leo as a lopster. s 
1 Tolg aiyraKolg /UKpofr; , ol yiyvovTni ual kv rolg tt orapoi^. A. II. 4. 4. 
- Long us t a or langusta, la langouste of the French, the Palinurus, probably has the same origin. 
This was corrupted to “long oyster” in the West Indies. (See The Natural History of Jamaica, by 
Hans Sloane, vol. ii, p. 271.) 
Locustse crusta fragile muniuntur in eo genore quod caret sanguine. Latent mensibus quiuis, 
similiter cancri qui eodem tempore occultantur, et ambo veris principio seuectutem anguium more 
exueruut reuovatione tergorum. Lib. lx, Cap. xxx, sec. 50. 
4 Cancrorum genera carabi, astaci maeae, paguri, heracleotici, leones et alia ignobiliora. Ibid., 
sec. 51. 
5 Creuyse according to Skeat, is probably a variation in the spelling of the Middle English for 
crayfish (crayf-ish), crevis, creves, crevise, or creveys; Old French, crevisse, or eserevisse ; Modern 
French, 6 crevisse ; Old High German, crebez ; Middle High Germau, lerebez ; German, Krebs, allied to 
Erabbe. 
6 Anglis astacus eat a creuyse of the sea, nam lopstar Anglorum, locusta est, non astacus; quam- 
quam Eliota. diversis locis astacum locustam et leonem interpretatus a Lopster (75, De Astaco , pp. 
113-121). [Eliota is Sir Thomas Elyot, who published a Latiu-English dictionary in 1538.] 
