Page 6 - DiNatale_2012

A part of the iconography on traps was also related to some religious or folkloric aspects of this fishery. Figure
34 shows an “ex voto” made in 1818 by a tuna fisherman after an accident in the tuna trap of Formica, near
Trapani, West Sicily, one of the very few concerning the trap fishery. Several images were published by
newspapers or popular publications in the second half of the XIX century. Figure 35 shows a tuna trap and the
manner of carryng the tunas, while Figure 36 shows the popular celebrations in Palermo of the first tuna caught
at the beginning of the season, which was carried around the downtown in a happy procession. At any rate, most
of the images showed the slaughtery (“mattanza”), because this activity was able to catch the attention of the
readers more than any other image of this fishery (Figure 37). At the same time, in the XIX century, some artists
depicted high quality paintings of trap fishery in Sicily, either for the interesting scenography or for the impact of
the images (Figure 38).

Of course, an extensive and good iconography was also available for the Spanish traps. The main reference paper
is the important “Diccionario de Artes de Pesca de España y sus posesiones” (Rodriguez Santamaria, 1920,
1923). In this case, the iconography shows in a clear way, with all the details, the difference between the two
main types of tuna traps (“almadraba de monteleva” and “almadraba de buche”) (Figures 39 to Figure 41),
providing many technical details and a full description in the text. The slaughtery was only rarely depicted and
the most known image is provided by the Spanish edition of Buffon (1839), but it was copied from the original
French edition (Figure 42). Other images of the “matanza” extist but they are less clear; artistic images or
paintings are not commonly available for the XIX century, while they became more common in the last part of
the XX century and in more recent years.

The iconography of trap fishery in the same centuries in France is not as diffused as it was in the XVIII century.
In this case, there are many replicas, with few variations, of the famous etching presented in Figure 17, while
some other etchings were published in popular magazines or books (Figures 43 to Figure 45). It seems that
several paintings on the tuna trap fishery were produced by various artists in the XIX century and Farrugio
(2012) prides some examples; Figure 46 shows a very high-quality painting by the artist Felix Ziem, which
provides evidence that tuna seine fishing was still active in the French Mediterranean coast at least until the end
of the XIX century, as is also confirmed by Farrugio (2012).

It is very interesting that, finally, some images of traps used in the Ottoman Empire (the actual Turkey) were
made available in a very few books (Deveriyan, 1915, 1926; Ninni, 1923), only very partly redrawn by
Karakulak and Oray (2009). Due to the very difficult availability of these images and the many varieties of tuna
traps used in the Turkish Mediterranean, in the Strait of Boshorous, in the Marmara Sea and in the western part
of the Black sea, it is supposed that Figure 47 provides a very interesting overview of tuna traps used in the
Ottoman Empire, between the end of the XIX century and the beginning of the XX century. From these images,
it is clear that traps between the eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea were very different one from the other,
with several small traps (as reported by Ninni, 1923) and a few large traps, but all able to catch good quantities
of bluefin tuna, intercepting the movements in both directions before entering, along and after leaving the
Bosphorous. From time to time a very few artistic images of the tuna fishery in the Turkish area become
available. Figure 48 shows two of these examples, possibly painted between the end of the XIX century and the
first part of the XX century by an unknown Turkish artist, on pages of old Holy books. Both paintings show
vessels with tuna nets and in one of the paintings there is a fisherman harpooning a tuna. It is not clear if the
artist intended to represent a trap net (maybe the final harvesting) or a seine fishing.

The bluefin tuna fishery along the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea was also very poor in terms of iconography
in old times. There are sevreal maps showing the location of tuna traps and a few books where this fishery is
described also in terms of images (De Marchesetti, 1882; de Loubeau, 1894; Krisch, 1900; Maggioli, 1937;
Ninni, 1917; Volpi Lisjak, 1996), but usually these are very poorly known. As a matter of fact, the tuna trap
fishery along the eastern Adriatic coast between the end of the XIX century and the beginning of the XX century
was very peculiar, with small traps set along the coast, in various places mostly located in the actual Croatia; the
tunas were spotted from the coast by spotters on rocks (Figure 49) or on the top of long ladders or pols, close to
the entrance of the trap. The traps were partly made by a set net and partly by a mobile net operated from a small
vessel, able to close the entrance when tunas entered (Figure 50). This fishery has not been practiced for many
years.

Tuna trap images from North African, eastern Mediterranean countries, Greece or Malta do not seem to be
available.

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