A Jew likes fish? - Chapter four - Canned fish

About the fish canning industry in ancient Israel - fourth and last chapter in the series

For the previous episodes in the series:

• A Jew likes fish?
• Fish ponds during the Second Temple period and after
• Tiberias: the capital of Galilean fishing

Along with the establishment of the fishing industry, a craft/industry of preserving fish developed in ancient Israel, with the help of this production were harnessed crafts such as ceramics, weaving/weaving (of baskets), salt production and more. During this period, good markets were found for the products in question in the cities that were founded, as well as fine customers such as the commissioner's court, the clerical apparatus and the presidency of the Land of Israel. And if many evidences were found relating to the preservation of fish products, we could link this to the branching out of trade and the marketing of the products abroad, what is called in the language of the Sages "the countries of the sea".

The fish canning industry became famous mainly in Tiberias, when near it is a site with a rich tradition in regards to fish canning. This is a historical settlement, Migdal Mastama or Migdal Nunia, aka the fish salting place. The fish would be wrapped between leaves and reeds or in baskets caught from the shoots of the date palm and called "legs" and marketed within the province and outside it and even to Rome itself.

Among the preserves, the following types can be distinguished: salted fish called "salty"; Terit, about which the Midrash explains as follows: "Temoni is terit" in his demand for the biblical verse - "For many days will be clean and the horses will be hidden", this is the blessing of Moses to Zebulun (Deuteronomy 33). That is, they used to bury - to preserve in salt. The terit used to be preserved in two ways: when it is whole or when it is chopped, hence the difference between "freshly crushed" and "fresh that is not crushed" (Talmud Babilli Avoda Zera Lt. p. 2).

Rabbi Dimi, born in the third century CE, testifies in the Babylonian Talmud that the Linai of the King (an image borrowed from a rich man like Korach, in terms of his testimony) were in the "King's Mountain" (a rich geographical area also known as "Tor Malka" and "Gay Basilike" in Greek). This is probably about the Yehuda lowlands between Gedera and Hadera) who put fresh cups of reboiler into chopped figs. Beyond the imagined, legendary voyage, which, according to the moral of the testimony, is in its essence to indicate the abundance of the produce of the fish preserves, and since the above-mentioned place is within the domain of the Roman imperial lands, we can attribute to this subject a measure of the influence of the production of the Roman produce.

It can be assumed that Acre was also an important production and marketing center for canned fish, and therefore earned the nickname "The Fish Gate".

In addition to the preserves, they also prepared liquid delicacies of fish that were called "stock", meaning the juice that comes out of salt-marinated fish, and with them various laws, and these required a great deal of grammar in distinguishing between permitted stock and prohibited stock, such as: of pottery) that holds satayim, if it has a weight of ten (e) Zoz (40 grams) in Judah, which are five (e) stones (twenty zoz) (80 grams) (and all the rest are pure fish) in the Galilee, impure fish is prohibited (because in the weight of a fish of one log there are 200 zoz, which is about 800 grams. And in the hundred there are 9600 zoz, which is 38,400 grams, which is 38.4 kg. And ten zoz = 40 grams of unclean fish in 800 grams of pure fish is one divided by 960. And this is the lesson of the carcass of an unclean fish that the majority prohibits, and if there is none of it like this lesson, the carcass in the stocking is permitted) Rabbi Yehuda says: fourth in the satayim (the fourth of the log is unclean fish, and in the satayim the carcass is prohibited. That is, the carcass of an unclean fish is prohibited in one of 192) and Rabbi Yossi says: One-sixteenth in it (that is, an unclean fish that is one-sixteenth in the stocking, the shaft is forbidden, and if the stocking holds satayim, which is 48 A log, after all, is one out of sixteen in which there are three logs, and if there is in the stock of an unclean fish as much as this rate, it is forbidden, and if it is less than that, such as the stock of a pure fish has sixteen against it, then it is void, and the whole stock is permitted" ). At least three types of hinges were known, such as: "Murays", whose name derives from the Latin muries, "Hilke" and "Hilmi".

And lest the presidency house be consumed, in accordance with the Roman economic policy of the Severus emperors (from the end of the second century to the quarter of the third century AD) to supply the imperial court with salted fish as well. In any case, this is how the interesting tradition in the Jerusalem Talmud can be interpreted: "It happened in one ship belonging to the Rabbi's house (Rabbi Yehuda the Hanasi), which had more than three hundred barrels..." (Jerusalem Talmud, Avoda Zerah, Chapter 3, Mb, p. 1). In any case, an interesting picture emerges before our eyes, which indicates the extent of the delivery of the hand of the Palestinian Authority, and its pull in the threads of international trade.

International trade? Indeed indeed. And Sage sources are not lacking in releasing information about the construction of ships, their launching and even their dimensions, such as: "...that a man should not make (build) a ship, which will be standing in the dock (disabled due to its size not being suitable in the port). Its width shall be one-sixth of its length, and its height one-sixth of its length" Tosefta Sukkah 7 3). Other evidence relates to the renting of ships, their buying and selling. In the collection of inscriptions and paintings in the vast cemetery at Beit Shaarim, ships were mentioned, or perhaps many shipowners or actual ship owners. From a collection of his letters of Sinzius, from the end of the third century AD it is recalled that on the journey to Africa the captain and part of the crew of sailors were - Jews (Epistolai, XNUMX:XNUMX).

Laws were also found regarding the transfer of goods from ship to ship or the instructions of the routers in the port and the preference for the passage of a "loaded ship" over an "empty ship", as well as the merchant ship's equipment, methods of loading and unloading, sailing times, etc.

It should be noted that canned fish and dried fish were marketed outside Judea, mainly through the Port of Acre and from the Nunia-Tarikhai tower to the east.