Something fishy
Russian deep sea fisherman’s catch includes creature plucked from the pages of a mediæval bestiary
This photograph of a fish resembling the bishop fish of mediæval bestiaries was published in the Englishlanguage Moscow Times last December. It was caught by Roman Fedortsov, a deep-sea fisherman based in Murmansk. In the 1990s Turkish fishermen caught a fish with ruddy pigmentation and vaguely humanoid features that bore a striking similarity to the old descriptions of bishop fish. According to marine folklore, the bishop fish or sea bishop is a large creature with a scaly, fishshaped body, claw-like flippers and a large fin, which it can wrap around itself in a fashion that resembles a clergyman’s cloak. Its skull, said to appear almost humanoid, bears an extended rough hewn brow, which reportedly resembles a bishop’s mitre; hence the creature’s name. There was a curious mediæval belief that every creature in the air or on the earth had its double in the sea.
The existence of bishop fish was first documented in 1433, when a specimen was found swimming in the Baltic. It was captured and given to the King of Poland, who was so taken by his new prize that he refused to return it to the sea. A group of Catholic bishops were granted an audience with the creature. The story goes that the fish gestured to the bishops, apparently communicating its desire to be released. The bishops urged the king to return it to its natural habitat, and eventually he agreed. Once set free, the grateful creature made the sign of the cross before plunging into the ocean depths.
In 1531 a bishop fish was caught off the German coast, but it refused to eat and died after three days. It was described and pictured in the fourth volume of Conrad Gesner’s famous Historiæ animalium (155158). Later, a “strange looking fish” described as “a peaceful creature that appeared to have the mitre of a bishop” was caught in the Atlantic off the British coast. It perished soon afterward, and its corpse was returned to the sea.
Scholars were always sceptical of this strange fish. Guillaume Rondelet, for example, who included a picture of a bishop fish in his Libri de piscibus marinis (1554-55), stated: “I think that certain details beyond the truth of the matter have been added by the painter to make the thing seem more marvellous.” Some researchers believe that the bishop fish may be a kind of deformed manta ray, whose features bear some slight semblance to those of a man. Those who subscribe to this theory claim that a ray’s “wings” could create the illusion of the cape-like appendage attributed to these creatures. The debate continues whether bishop fish are some kind of anomalous variety of known marine life or an altogether new species. Cryptopia, 15 Dec 2009; gizmodo.com, 20 Dec 2016.