Oppian

I sing the Natives of the boundless Main,
And tell what Kinds the wat'ry Depths contain...
What various Arts the finny Herds beguile,
And each cold Secret of the Fishers' Toil.

Oppian (Ancient Greek: Ὀππιανός; Latin: Oppianus) was a 2nd-century Greco-Roman poet during the reign of the emperors Marcus Aurelius and Commodus, who composed the Halieutica, a five-book didactic epic on fishing.

Quotes

• Ἔθνεά τοι πόντοιο πολυσπερέας τε φάλαγγας
  παντοίων νεπόδων, πλωτὸν γένος Ἀμφιτρίτης,
  ἐξερέω, γαίης ὕπατον κράτος, Ἀντωνῖνε·
  ὅσσα τε κυματόεσσαν ἔχει χύσιν, ᾗχί θ’ ἕκαστα
  ἐννέμεται, διερούς τε γάμους διεράς τε γενέθλας
  καὶ βίον ἰχθυόεντα καὶ ἔχθεα καὶ φιλότητας
  καὶ βουλάς, ἁλίης τε πολύτροπα δήνεα τέχνης
  κερδαλέης, ὅσα φῶτες ἐπ’ ἰχθύσι μητίσαντο
  ἀφράστοις· ἀΐδηλον ἐπιπλώουσι θάλασσαν
  τολμηρῇ κραδίῃ, κατὰ δ’ ἔδρακον οὐκ ἐπίοπτα
  βένθεα καὶ τέχνῃσιν ἁλὸς διὰ μέτρα δάσαντο
  δαιμόνιοι.
  • I sing the Natives of the boundless Main,
    And tell what Kinds the wat'ry Depths contain.
    Thou, Mighty Prince, whom farthest Shores obey,
    Favour the Bard, and hear the humble Lay;
    While the Muse shows the liquid Worlds below,
    Where throng'd with busie Shoals the Waters flow;
    Their diff'ring Forms and Ways of Life relates;
    And sings their constant Loves, and constant Hates;
    What various Arts the finny Herds beguile,
    And each cold Secret of the Fishers Toil.
    Intrepid Souls! who pleasing Rest despise,
    To whirl in Eddies, and on Floods to rise;
    Who scorn the Safety of the calmer Shore,
    Drive thro' the working Foam, and ply the lab'ring Oar.
    Th' Abyss they fathom, search the doubtful Way,
    And through obscuring Depths pursue the Prey.
  • Halieutica, bk. 1, proemium (ed. A. W. Mair, 1928; tr. William Diaper, 1722)