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Str. And that which belongs to the daytime is, as a whole, barb-hunting, since the spears, as well as the hooks, are tipped with barbs.
220
Theaet. Yes, it is so called.
220
Str. Then of striking which belongs to barb-hunting, that part which proceeds downward from above, is called, because tridents are chiefly used in it, tridentry, I suppose.
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Theaet. Yes, some people, at any rate, call it so.
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Str. Then there still remains, I may say, only one further kind.
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Theaet. What is that?
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Str. The kind that is characterized by the opposite sort of blow, which is practised with a hook and strikes, not any chance part of the body of the fishes, as tridents do, but only the head and mouth of the fish caught, and proceeds from below upwards, being pulled up by twigs and rods. By what name, Theaetetus, shall we say this ought to be called?
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Theaet. I think our search is now ended and we have found the very thing we set before us a while ago as necessary to find.
221
Str. Now, then, you and I are not only agreed about the name of angling, but we have acquired also a satisfactory definition of the thing itself. For of art as a whole, half was acquisitive, and of the acquisitive, half was coercive, and of the coercive, half was hunting, and of hunting, half was animal hunting, and of animal hunting, half was water hunting, and, taken as a whole, of water hunting the lower part was fishing, and of fishing, half was striking, and of striking, half was barb-hunting, and of this the part in which the blow is pulled from below upwards at an angle Plato’s etymology—ἀσπαλιευτική from ἀνασπᾶσθαι— is hardly less absurd than that suggested in the translation. The words at an angle are inserted merely to give a reason In English for the words which follow them. has a name in the very likeness of the act and is called angling, which was the object of our present search.
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Theaet. That at all events has been made perfectly clear.
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Str. Come, then, let us use this as a pattern and try to find out what a sophist is.
