“Except to politicians, a decent definition is a help and a delight.”
Acting on this American dictum I start with two definitions, one of Fishing and Angling, the other of Angling. The first we owe to that past master of the art, Plato. Whether it come within the category of “delight or help,” or whether he can endorse the verdict of Theætetus as to its “satisfactory conclusion,” each reader must decide.
Plato, using the method of elimination and incidentally more than three pages of print, eventually arrives at the following definition of Fishing and Angling:[82] “Then, now you and I have come to an understanding, not only about the name of the Angler’s art, but about the definition of the thing itself. One half of all Art was acquisitive: one half of the acquisitive Art was conquest or taking by force: half of this again was hunting, and half of hunting was hunting animals: of this again the under half was fishing, and half of fishing was striking: a part of striking was fishing with a barb, and one half of this again (being the kind which strikes with a hook and draws the fish from below upwards) is the Art we have been seeking, and which from the nature of the operation is denoted Angling or drawing up.”
Theætetus: “The result has been quite satisfactorily brought out.”
In search of a more helpful definition I turn to the English Dictionaries. The N.E.D. (New English Dictionary, Oxford) gives Fishing—“to catch, or try to catch fish”—wide enough for all our purpose and for most of our performances! In their definitions of Angling, Angle, etc., the majority of dictionaries disagree, but unite in deriving Angle from the Aryan root, ANK = to bend, and establishing the fishing term as the cousin of the awkward angles of Euclid and of our youth. The N.E.D. in its definitions of ‘Angle’ (sb.), of ‘Angle’ (vb.), of ‘Angler,’ or of ‘Angling,’ does not even agree with itself.
Thus we find:
(A) “Angle (sb.), a fish hook: often in later use extended to the line, or tackle, to which it is fastened, and the Rod to which this is attached. See Book of St. Alban’s (title of ed. 2), Treatyse perteynynge to Hawkynge, Huntynge, and Fysshynge with an Angle.”
(B) “Angle (vb.), to use an angle: to fish with a hook and bait.”
(C) “Angler, one who fishes with a hook and line.”
(D) “Angling, the action or art of fishing with a rod.”[83]