Fish
Culture

Fish themes have symbolic significance in many religions. In ancient Mesopotamia, fish offerings were made to the gods from the very earliest times. Fish were also a major symbol of Enki, the god of water. Fish frequently appear as filling motifs in cylinder seals from the Old Babylonian (c. 1830 BC – c. 1531 BC) and Neo-Assyrian (911–609 BC) periods. Starting during the Kassite Period (c. 1600 BC – c. 1155 BC) and lasting until the early Persian Period (550–30 BC), healers and exorcists dressed in ritual garb resembling the bodies of fish. During the Seleucid Period (312–63 BC), the legendary Babylonian culture hero Oannes was said to have dressed in the skin of a fish. Fish were sacred to the Syrian goddess Atargatis and, during her festivals, only her priests were permitted to eat them. In the Book of Jonah, the central figure, a prophet named Jonah, is swallowed by a giant fish after being thrown overboard by the crew of the ship he is travelling on. Early Christians used the ichthys, a symbol of a fish, to represent Jesus. Among the deities said to take the form of a fish are Ikatere of the Polynesians, the shark-god Kāmohoaliʻi of Hawai ʻ i, and Matsya of the Hindus. The constellation Pisces ("The Fishes") is associated with a legend from Ancient Rome that Venus and her son Cupid were rescued by two fishes.

Fish feature prominently in art, in films such as Finding Nemo and books such as The Old Man and the Sea. Large fish, particularly sharks, have frequently been the subject of horror movies and thrillers, notably the novel Jaws, made into a film which in turn has been parodied and imitated many times. Piranhas are shown in a similar light to sharks in films such as Piranha.
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