[284] VII. 276, W. R. Paton’s Translation.
[285] Cf. Pausanias, III. 21, 5: “Men fear to fish in the Lake of Poseidon, for they think he who catches fish in it is turned into a fish called The Fisher.” In I. 38, 1, we find that only the priests were allowed to fish, because the rivers were sacred to Demeter, and in VII. 22, 4, that the fish at Pharae were sacred to Hermes, and so inviolate.
[286] In gratitude for the part played by certain fish in bringing to the banks of the Euphrates the egg, from which came Aphrodite, Zeus placed fishes among the stars—hence the Pisces. Diognetos of Erythrai ap. Hyg., poet. astr., 2. 30, make these “certain fish” Venus and Cupid. Cf. Myth. Vat., I. 86.
[287] Cf. Diod. Sic., II. 20.
[288] Some recent scholars hold that Poseidon was an early differentiation of Zeus, and that his fish-spear was developed from the three-pronged lightning symbol of that deity as soon as the former became himself specialised into first a river god, and second a sea god. From my friend Mr. A. B. Cook’s forthcoming work, Zeus, vol. ii. c. 6, s. 4, I learn that the commonly supposed Trident (in Æschylus, Septem., I. 31), “the fish-striking tool of the sea-god,” is more likely in pre-classical times to have been the three-pronged lightning symbol of the highest Deity of all, and observable not only in Greece, but also in Asia. Against this view lies the fact that only once in all the Greek art is Poseidon represented with an unmistakable thunder-bolt, and this is on a silver tetradrachm of Messana about 450 b.c. The name Poseidon merely equals, it is held, ποτεί-Δας, or ‘Lord Zeus,’ the correlative of πότνια Ἥρη, ‘Lady Hera.’
[289] See Oppian’s invocation of him in III. 9-28.
[290] Ibid. As Pan was worshipped as the god of animals, especially of herds, on land, so did the fisherfolk venerate him, Πὰν ἅκτιος (Theocr., Id., V. 14) or ἁλίπλαγκτος (Soph., Aj., 695: cf. Anth. Pal., X. 10), as the god of the animals of the sea, and in especial for his service to them in netting Typhon, whose “winds wrought havoc to their boats, and when Auster with Sirocco breath prevailed, caused their catches to go bad.” At Athens the god was regarded with gratitude as a powerful benefactor, because of the aid vouchsafed in securing naval victories (Hdt., 6. 105. Simonides frag. 133, Bergk4)
[291] To Janus, however, the credit of being the first to teach the art of Fishing to the Latins is assigned by Alexander Sardus, De Rerum Inventoribus, II. 16. This in common with the belief that Janus invented boats is probably a mistaken inference from the fact that the early as libralis had a head of Janus on one side and the prow of a ship on the other (Roscher, Lex. Myth., II. p. 23).
[292] The description in Anth. Pal., X. 10, “Me, Pan, the fishermen have placed on this holy cliff, the watcher here over the fair anchorage of the harbour; and I take care now of the baskets and again of the trawlers off this shore,” and in Archias (Anth. Pal., X. 7, and 8) of the fishermen making an image of Priapus to be set up, just where the sea leaves the shore, are only three of very many similar passages. Among the Eleans Apollo was honoured as a God under the title of The Fish-eater (Athen., VIII. 36). In addition to Gods we read of Tritons who were half-men, half-fish, and of a still more wonderful being, an Ichthyocentaurus, whose upper body was of human form, and lower that of a fish, while in place of the hands were horses’ hooves!
[293] The Phigaleans (in Arkadia) worshipped an old wooden image, called Eurynome, which represented a woman to the hips, a fish below. This curious effigy was kept bound in golden chains and was regarded by the inhabitants as a form of Artemis: see Paus., 8. 41, 4-6. A large Bœotian vase at Athens shows Artemis with a great fish painted on the front of her dress, a clear indication that she was held locally to be a goddess of fishing (M. Collignon and L. Couve, Catalogue des Vases Peints du Musée National d’Athènes (Paris, 1902), p. 108 f., No. 462; cp. Ib., No. 463).