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MNU 1704414
MNU 1704414// 211407652
211407652

Title:
Title: The
The mortal
mortal sea : fishing the Atlantic in the Age of Sail /
sea : ■shing the Atlantic in the Age of Sail /
Author: Bolster, W. Jeffrey.
Author: Bolster, W. Jeffrey. W. W. Jeffrey Bolster
Jeffrey Bolster
ArticleTitle:
ArticleTitle: Depleted European Seas
Depleted European and the
Seasand Discovery of
the Discovery of America
America
ArticleAuthor: Bolster, W. Jeffrey. W. Jeffrey Bolster
ArticleAuthor: Bolster, W. Jeffrey. W. Jeffrey Bolster
Date:
Date: 2014
2014 Pages:
Pages:12-48
12-48
OCLC
OCLC - 780415768;
780415768; ISBN
ISBN - 9780674047655;
- - 9780674047655;
Publisher:
Publisher: Cambridge, Mass. :: Belknap
Cambridge, Mass. Press of Harvard
Belknap Pressof Univer
Harvard Univer
Copyright:
Copyright: CCL
CCL

______________________________________________________________________________

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 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF
AMERICA 13

in theGulf of St.Lawrence.Theretheyencountered familiar marine

a ecosys-
tem that was “new” only in the sensethat it had not beensystematicallyhar-
vestedfor centuriesby ■shermenusingsophisticatedtechnologies catch,
to
preserve,andmarketsea■sh.This wasdistinctfrom thePhilippineSeas,where
Magellan’smenhad seen“large seasnails,beautifulin appearance,” probably
One chamberednautilus(Nautiluspompz'lius); fromtheAmericantropics,where
or
oystersimprobablygrew on mangrovetrees,and wherecrystal-clearwaters
SEAS promptedEuropeannewcomers suchasChristopherColumbusto startleread-
DEPLETED EUROPEAN
erswith depictionsof■sh“sounlike oursthatit is amazing,”■sh“of thebright-
est colors in the world—blue, yellow, red, multi-Colored, colored in
AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA ways.” GonzaloFernandezde Oviedo’sNatural History of the WestIndies,
a thousand

availablein Londonin Englishtranslation early

as as1555,reinforcedtheCa-
ribbean’sbizarreallure. It introducedEnglish readers
to anecosystempopu-
The NativeStapleof eachCountry is the Richesof the latedby “manateeand mureneand
manyother■sheswhich haveno namesin
Country, and is perpetual and never to be consumed; our language.”The experienceof Magellan,Columbus,and Oviedo could
Beastsof the Earth, Fowls of the Air, and Fishes of the not havebeenmoredifferentfrom thatof theEnglishmanAnthonyParkhurst,
Sea,Naturally Increase. who foundhimselfin themidst of reassuringlyfamiliar
a seanearNewfound-
land in 1578.“As touching the kindes of Fish beside Cod,” he
—Nicholas Barbon, A Discourseof Trade, 1690 wrote,” there are
Herrings, Salmons, Thorneback [skates], Plase, rather
or wee should call
them Flounders, Dog ■sh Oisters, and Muskles.” Customers of English
...
■shmongers would not ■inchfrom suchfare or needto cultivate
a tastefor
the exotic.The living oceanalongthe northeast of Americamirrored
coast
Renaissanceseafarersand cartographersconfrontedthe “great andmarvel— Englishmen’scoastalecosystemat home.2
astonishingwaysafter1522,whentheremnant Rivetedto a land-centeredgeography,modernpeoplehavedif■cultyimag-
ousthingsof theOceanSea”in ining the meaningfuloceanicareasthat
of FerdinandMagellan’stattered■eetarrived1nSev1llefollowingtheir unpre weresecondnature for experienced
mariners at the birth of the Atlantic world,
cedentedcircumnavigation.Within a few yearsAntonio Pigafetta,the rsnost or how areas of the coastal ocean
had alreadybeenchangedby human in■uences.Sixteenth-century
literary of the survivors,produceda mernorableacc‘ountof thatpgean lea: voyages
suchasSir HumphreyGilbert’sreconnoiteringofNewfoundlandin 1583have
immensity and exotic variety, a tantalizmg tale of Icontrary Win 5, ca31(i
almostalwaysbeenpresentedasa
and rains” in the equatorialdoldrums, “large ■shw1thfearsometeethca e passagefrom the Old World to the New
World ratherthan asan episodeoccurringin singleoceanicregion.But the
tiburoni” in the SouthAtlantic, and incomprehensiblygiganucshell■shnear a
experiencedmenaboardGilbert’s smallship
Borneo—“the■eshof one which weighedtwenty-sixpoundsand the 01ther sawit both ways:what English
sailorscalledthe“New—found-land” surroundedby familiar
forty-four.”As similar reportsby otherexplorersmeldedbackto Europ: 1:ong was a sort ofsea,
of Magellanan tSlain albeitoneswarmingwith ■sh.3
far—■ung searoutesfrom theWestIndies to the Stralts
appeared A pamphletpublishedby RobertHitchcockin 1580
archipelagos, the oceanfrontierandits webof life evermoremyser suggestshow contem-
rovocative.1 porariesunderstoodthe■shingbanksof Newfoundland somethinglike
ouiyiiefnahile as an
extensionof the Irish Sea.Lobbying his countrymento build
Basque,Breton,Portuguese,andEnglishWestCountry ■ishe: 400 “■shyng
■shnearNewfoundlan an Shippes:aftermannerofFlemmishBusses,” Dutchherringboats
men quietly crossedthe Atlantic eachspring to as werethen
 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
l4 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 15

known, Hitchcock, a military strategist, veteran ofwars on the Continent, and

-the watersof the North Seaor the English Channelhad hauled
net re-
arecently
■sheriespromoter, envisioned that in “March, having victuals for ■vemonths, spondedto a tug on theirlines,or examinedthe stomach
contentsof a
with hooks, lines, and salt,” eachtown’s ■eetcould “set out to ■shfor Cod and
caught■shto seewhatit hadbeeneating,they studiedthe sea’s
creatures.By
the time someof those■shermenbeganto harvestthe
Ling where theTown liketh best;or elseto Newfoundland.”Hitchcock’s watersaroundNew-
... foundlandandin theGulf of St.Lawrenceduring theearlysixteenth
Elizabethanrenderingof theNorth Atlantic crossingascommonplace not only century
the similaritieswith homewaters or,
backinto the story of Americanbeginningswheretheybelong, striking. Whetherin the Irish Sea
puts ■shermen were
but, moreimportantly,illuminatesthe borealNorth Atlantic asa singleeco- on the Grand Banksof Newfoundland,■shermenwatchedfulmarswheeling
overhead,eagerforbits of “gurry,” theentrailsandbitsof ■eshdiscardedwhen
systemlinking the coastof Lancashirewith the banksof Newfoundland—a
places.4 cleaning■sh.At night,whenconditions
systembeingaffectedby humanactivitiesat differentratesin different wereright fordino■agellates andother
bioluminescentorganisms,disturbancesin the
When Hitchcockandhis contemporariesadvocatedexpandingEngland’s water lingered as a ghostly
■sheries,they did not imaginean “Atlantic Ocean”separatingEuropefrom greentrace,whetherpromptedby the splashof a leadline or by a dolphin’s
America. The sailors working in what we call the northwest Atlantic, whether smuoustrack. Shoalsof silveryherring roseto the surfaceafter sunset.Cod
tookbait by day;hake,by night. Mostof thestar■sh,
English,Basque,French,Spanish,or Portuguese,understoodthat they were anemones,lobsters and
as,they
whelkslookedthe same.Sodid toothless,■lter—feeding baskingsharks
■shingon the periphery of a body of water called variously the “Western
plowedslowlythroughnutrient—rich waterswith their oversizedmouthsagape.
Ocean,” “Mar Del Nort,” or “Great Ocean Sea.” During the 15205,when the
Someof thosesharkswerelongerthanthestoutlyplankedshallopsfromwhich
colonizationandimportanceofNorth Americastill layfarin thefuture, ocean
basinswereneithernamednor conceptualizedin the constantwaysthat seem men■shed.Other seamonsters,suchas'theninety-footerthatwashedashore
naturaltoday.The term Atlantic, for instance,did not becomecommonplace at Tynemouthin 1532(probably a blue whale)or “the piercing serpent
thatis in thesea”(referredto in thebook ofIsaiah), ...
until theseventeenthcentury;it wasnot usedconsistentlyuntil theeighteenth wereregardedasportents
century.By then,of course,theAtlantick Sea(or Atlantic Ocean)wasunder— or supernaturalprodigies—glimpses of theinexplicablethat struck■shermen
w1thfear and reinforcedthe skimpinessof their understandingof the world
stood to separateEuropefrom America.During the sixteenthcentury,how-
illuminated European beneaththeir keels.6As theyclearedkelpfrom their anchorsandpeered
'ever,when whale oil from the Gulf of St. Lawrence the sideat the ■shon their lines,■shermencould
over
lampsand lubricatedprimitive Europeanbearings,when dried cod from the not helpbut seethe north-
coasts of Newfoundland ■lled the bellies of European soldiers, artisans, and
westAtlantic ecosystemasbiologicallyandgeologicallyakin to thenortheast
Atlantic theyhadleft behind.
town-dwellers,andwhenthousandsof transientEuropeanmarinersfrequented
Oceanographers refer to that greatarc of oceanstretchingwestwardfrom
thosedistantshoreseachyear,theNorth Americanmainlandremainedvague
the British Isles to Newfoundland the North Atlantic borealregion.
at bestbeyondthedistanceof a harquebusshotfrom theshore.The outlineof as
cludes the North Sea,the Irish Sea,the English Channel, the
It in-
Newfoundlanditselfwasnot evenaccuratelymappeduntil 1612,whenSamuel Norwegian Sea
the waterssouthof Icelandand Greenland,and the largemarine ecosysterri
de Champlainturned his considerablecartographicskills to the challenge.
from the north coastof CapeCod to Newfoundlandandsouthern
And for a century beforehand,Renaissanceseafarerssaw the real action as Labrador
Wltll its easternand westernedgessculptedby thePleistocene its
neither in “America” nor in the “Atlantic Ocean,” but on the shallow extremi- glaciations-
SImIIarltiesin oceantemperature,productivity, food supplies,and predaior—
tiesof the“Great OceanSea.”5
Fromthe standpointof thosesixteenth-centuryEuropean■shermenmore Preyrelationships;andits relativelyuniform populationsof boreal■sh,includ-
familiarwith tarredhemprope andleather■shingapronsthanwith chartsof ing herring, cod, and salmon, the historic North Atlantic boreal region
was
Characterized
by de■ningunities;in factthe EuropeanandAmericanboreal
the world, and more comfortabletalking about seasonalbaits and favorable
bottomconditionsthanaboutglobalgeography,thecold, graywaterslapping coastssharemanyidenticalanimalsandplants,andmanyothersthat
31milar.
arevery
the coastof Newfoundlandwereratherroutine.Everytime■shermen working
16 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
Biogeography,or thecorrespondence of organismsto place,is thebasisfor
contemporaryoceanographers’division of the oceansinto natural regions.
Seawatertemperatureis the single most important factor in de■ningthose
regions.Sixteenth-and seventeenth-centuryseamenunderstoodthe basic
relationshipbetweenoceantemperatureand residentspecies.They under-
stoodin an elementalway thattheMediterraneanwasa separatebiogeograph-
ical regionfrom theNorth Atlantic borealregion,andthat eachwasseparate
from the Arctic Sea. The warm, saline Gulf Stream served as the southern
boundaryto theentireNorth Atlantic borealregion;icy subarcticwaterscre-
atedits northernboundary.While somespeciessuchasblue■ntuna, sword-
■sh,and humpbackwhalesmigrated from one distinct oceanicregion to
another,mostspeciesthrivedwithin a certain rangeof watertemperatures.A
sixteenth-centurymarinerleavingthe EnglishChannelfor the Bayof Biscay
would haveconfrontedalbacore,anchovy,pilchards,and congereel.Sailing
north throughthe Celtic Seatowardthe FaroeIslands,he would havefound
ling, herring, andharborseals.Temperaturemattered.“Greenland” was the
“slaughtering house”of the world, according to Daniel Fell in 1659,becauseof
its vastpopulationof“the greatandwarlikeHorsesof theSea,”now known as
marinemammal.Walrus,like mostothercrea-
walrus,a temperature-sensitive
tures,congregatedin speci■cregionsof the sea.Sixteenth-andseventeenth-
centuryvoyagesto Newfoundlandfrom northernFranceandthe British Isles
sometimestook placeentirelywithin the North Atlantic borealregion.More
commonly,outbound shipmastersencounteringprevailing westerlieson a
starboard tack were forced to the southwest into warmer waters, where “the
strange■shwhich we theresaw,”accordingto ChristopherLevettin 1623,in-
cluded“somewith wings ■yingabovethe water.”Flying ■sh,alongwith the
and multihued dorado,denizensof the tropics and temperate
blunt—headed
Atlantic drift current, were strangersto boreal seas.7
Europeanfishermen’scomplacentfamiliarity with thenorthwestAtlantic’s
marine ecosystemduring the sixteenthcentury has not ■ttedwell with the
dominantnarrativeof Americaasa New World. Romanticnationalhistories
of the sort that ■oweredduring the nineteenthcentury,andwhich still have
manyreadersin their grip, had a desperateneedfor colonialbeginnings,such
asthe voyageof theMay■oweror thesettlementof Quebec.Nationalisthisto-
rians regardedthe oceanasa non-place,an apparentlyeternalsourceof ■sh
and whales, an inscrutable testing ground, and a dangerous,if necessary,means
of conveyance.The eventualcolonizationof North Americaby Europeans,
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF
AMERICA 17
and the subsequent creation of nations there, however, overshadowedthe
fact
thatfor morethana centurythefamiliarcoastalmarine
ecosystemwastheonly
part of North America of consistentinterest to Europeans.Sixteenth-and
early-seventeenth-centurymapsof what are now Atlantic Canadaand New
England delineated the sea from the shore with single line, revealing little
a
detail of the interior landmass, but highlighting the shoals, islands,
ocean
basins, and river mouths in which Europeanmariners encounteredright
whales, haddock, mackerel, and herring. For
more than a century before per-
manentsettlementstook root, transient■shermen wereamphibiousdenizens
of theNorth Americancoastalenvironment,fully at homeneither theinhos-
on
pitableshorenor on its off-lying■shinggrounds.Long afterEuropeancoloni-
zationof theregioncommenced,oceanharvestingremainedcentral coastal
to
people’seconomicdevelopmentandcultural elaboration.
ECOSYSTEMS IN TIME
European■shermenfamiliar with the North Sea,the EnglishChannel,and
the Irish Seahad learnedtheir tradein
one of the world’s most productive
■shinggrounds,a setofecosystems in whichhumanshadbeenplayersto
vary-
ing degreesfor millennia. Ecosystems be imagined functional units
can as
consistingof all of their organisms(including humans)interactingwith
one
anotherand theirphysicalenvironmentthroughtime.Ecosystems natural,
are
but never timeless. In both terrestrial and marine
ecosystems,“natural” does
not equatewith “static,” andthe complicatedfunctioningof anecosystem, in
which ■uctuationsare inherent, can be shifted significantly by nonhuman
natural events,suchasstormsor climatechange, by intensivehuman
or pres-
sure,suchasoverharvestingor habitatalteration.A schematicpresentationof
ecosystems’functioning can all too easilyconveythe impressionof consis-
tency,but attentionto timescalesandchangesovertimeareespecially
germane
whenoneis examiningthe living
ocean.
The oceanis an extraordinarily changeableenvironment,much more'
than many terrestrial ones. Seasonaland annual variations exist, so
as on shore,
alongwith cyclicalvariationsandgradualtrendsin speciescomposition,
eco-
systemproductivity,andothercharacteristics. The seaitselfis sharplydivided
in placesby thermoclines,layersof waterthat
separateareasdifferingin tem-
perature.It is anythingbut immutable.The oceanchangesdaily, seasonally,
andhistorically,aswell asoverevolutionaryandgeologicaltime.8
18 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY
OF AMERICA 19
Ecologicaltimescalesin the seavary from thoseon land.The primary pro- it appearedat mealaftermealfor both peopleofmeansandthe
ducersat the baseof the marinefood chain are phytoplankton,microscopic commonsort.
ObservantCatholicswerenot theonly
consumersof herring.After theRefor~
plants that live only for days.The primary producerson land, by contrast, mation,Protestantsfrom Englandto Scandinaviasustainedtheir
appetitefor
includeperennialgrassesand treeswith life spansmeasurablein decadesor the silvery little fish. But herring
werenot universallyavailable.Periodsof
centuries.Marinesystemsarethusmuchmoreresponsivethanterrestrialones robustherring landingsin theEnglishChannel,theBayofBiscay,and
waters
to modestclimatechanges.Risingor falling atmospherictemperatures canin- eastof Swedencorresponded,it turns out, with severewinter conditionsin
■uenceoceanwatersin a speci■clocale,affectingthe distribution of phyto- westernEurope,intenseseaiceoffIceland,andrelativelyweakwesterlywinds.
plankton,zooplankton(microscopicanimals),andichthyoplankton(larval■sh Conversely,long stretchesof mild Europeanwinters
andeggs),which in turn can lead to shiftsin the ■shcommunitiessoughtby were associatedwith
modest herring catches. This pattern
was not entirely understood until 1997,
humans. when a study demonstratedcorrelationsbetweenclimate ■uctuations
and
For peopleinterestedin historical ecosystemsand the way humanshave herring catches over six centuries, from
1340to 1978.The important point is
affectedthem,determiningsomesort of baselinefrom which to chartchange that natural cycles,such the North Atlantic Oscillation, humans
as over which
is necessary.However,this is a challenge:researchincreasinglyshowsthat havelittle or no in■uence,providethe background“noise”
againstwhich‘we
therehasneverbeenan absolutesteadybaselinemarinecommunity—apris- mustlookfor “signals”indicatinghumanimpactsoncoastalsystems.10
tine or natural system.Fluctuationsare the norm, and temporaryalternative Marine environmentsareso complexthat differentiatingthe signalsfrom
stablestatesare possible.Human impactson the systemmust be assessed the noiseis not alwaysstraightforward.The signi■canthistorical
shifts be—
againstconstantlyoccurringnaturalchangein which, asonebiologistputs it, tween.populationsofherring andpilchards(asardine-like■sh)in the
virtually “imperceptibleenvironmental■uctuationsmay be associatedwith western
EnglishChannelmakethe point. Sincethe Middle Ages■shermen
in Corn-
biological changesof great economic impact.”9 Likewise, economic impacts, wall and Brittany havelived by harvestingherring and pilchards,
but they
suchas over■shingor habitatdestruction,can lead to substantivebiological understoodnot only that■ushherring
years couldalternate with leanherring
changes,which maypush a coastalecosystem into an alternativestablestate. years,but that herring might be replacedby pilchards, or vice versa,some-
Distinguishingbetweenhumanandnonhumancausesof changein marine timesfor extendedperiods.Theseregimeshiftsin the
westernEnglishChan-
ecosystems requiressomeunderstandingof theroleof environmentalvariabil- nel haveoccurredfor centuries,with real
consequences for harvestersand
ity, includinglong—term climatechangeandperiodic■uctuations.The North their communities.Herring predominateswhen
Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) has been one of the primary weathermakers in one of its favoritefoods, a
certainspeciesof arrow worm, existsin largenumbers.When environmental
Europefor millennia, a phenomenon that affected whenarmiescould march, conditionschangeso thatthezooplankton dominatedby different
are a species
whenshipscouldsail,andwhethera givenwinter wouldbebearable.Relative ofarrow worm, which pilchards eat, pilchards outnumber herring.ll
differencesin atmosphericpressurebetweenIcelandandtheAzorescreatethe While humanshaveaffectedfish populationsfor centuries,
NAG.Strongwesterlywindsandrelativelymild wintersin Europeleadto ahigh evenfor millen-
nia in somecoastalseas,it is clearthat multiyearanddecadal■uctuations
are
NAO index. Conversely7 a low NAO index correspondsto weakwesterlies, “normal” in many marine populations—including
which allow colder Siberianair to dominatecoastalEurope,creatingmore onesthat humanslike to
hunt. That is a complicatingfactorloomingin thebackgroundof
thenew■eld
severewinterweatherconditions. of marine environmentalhistory, in which interdisciplinary
study of mari-
Those oscillationsdeterminedmore than which harborswould freezeor tlme communitiesand marineenvironmentsmustpayattentionto linked phe-
how manybasketsoffaggotsandturf wereneededto withstanda winter.They nornenaoccurring on widely varying timescales.The critical challengeis to
in■uencedthe availabilityof herring, that staffof life in Christian Europeon av01dthefalsedichotomythatchangesin marine
systemsarecausedeitherby
the numerousmeatlessdaysof theRomanCatholicliturgicalcalendar.Herring human factors(suchas over■shing,pollution, habitat destruction)
or or by
wasthe mostwidely eatenfishin medievalEurope.Smoked,salted,or pickled, natural environmentaleffects.The impact of ■shing in the
occurs contextof
20 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
environmental effects, and vice versa. If, for instance, environmental condi-
tionsbecomelessfavorablefor pilchards,continued■shingfor pilchardswill
exacerbatethosepoor environmentalconditions,makingit lesslikely thatthe
pilchard stockwill be ableto withstandthe downturn. The seais a variable
environmentthat doesnot provide endlesslyor produceeternally.The fact
thatit changes,both naturallyand asa resultofhumanin■uences, meansthat
it hasa history.The factthatpeoplerely on it, and createsomeof thechanges,
meansthat theocean’shistory andhumanhistoriesareentwined.
Seawateris the most deceiving0f mediums.Appearing uniform from the
surface, or to an observer without instrumentation, the water in most areasof
the oceanactuallyis naturally strati■edinto layersof differentdensities,the
resultof variationsin temperatureandsalinity.Scientistsconceptualizethose
layersas the “water column.” Its distinctions areas telling as zoningregula—
tionsin a city ashore.The photic zone,or layerthroughwhich sunlightpene-
tratesand in which plants can grow, lies on the surface.Meanwhiledense,
nutrient—rich water,fertilizedwith creatures’excrementandthedecomposing
bodiesof deadorganisms,settlesto the depths.Unmixed seawaterremains
relativelylifeless;life in the oceandependson plants,andthosemicroscopic
plants cangrow only in the presenceof bothlight andnutrients.The crucial
nutrientsinclude carbon,nitrogen, phosphorous,and silica. If nutrients re-
mainin thedepthsandthe light is limited to thesurface,the oceanremainsa
virtual desert.That is typically the casethroughoutthe sevenseas.In certain
parts of the world, however,including the easternand westernedgesof the
North Atlantic borealregion,currentscolliding overrelativelyshallowbanks
stir seawaterin the presenceoflight. Suchmixing is theincubatoroflife. For
instance,nutrient—rich polar waterflowingsouthwardtowardtheBritish Isles
mixeswith the easternextremityof theGulf Streamon a multitudeofhistoric
■shinggroundssuchas BallynahinchBank,FastnetGround, andthe Patch.
In the western Atlantic, the cold, nutrient—ladenLabrador Current ■owssouth—
ward andmixeswith warm Gulf Streamwaterson the storiedGrand Banks
and GeorgesBank, aswell ason lesser■shing grounds, some of which receive
additionalnutrientscarriedbyrivers’runoff.Rotarytidal Currentsfurtheraffect
the watercolumnaboveeachof thosebanksasthe twice-dailyebband■ood
swirls the sea.The resultantmixing andupwellingprovide idealconditions
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 21
for free-■oatingphytoplankton,the microscopicplantsat thebaseof the ma-
rine foodpyramid.
.
The productivity in which ■shermenwere interested(andwhich wasso
notable around the British Isles, 0n the Norwegian coast, in the western Baltic
Sea,andalongthe westernAtlantic shorebetweenCapeCod andNewfound-
land)dependedon whatoceanographers callprimary production—theability
of photosynthesizingplantsandmicroalgaeto convertnutrientsinto energy-
rich organiccompoundsin thepresenceoflight.12In 1583,whenEdwardHayes
observed“AbundanceOfWhales”nearPlacentiaandGrandBay,Newfound-
land, and simultaneouslynotedsilvery schoolsof “Herring, the largestthat
havebeneheardof, andexceedingtheMalstrondherringof Norway,”hewas
sailingthrough asavorysoupchock-fullofprotein, carbohydrates, andlipids,
thephytoplanktonandzooplankton0f the summerbloom.”
Primaryproductivityin the seais basedon phytoplanktonabundance.The
microscopicalgaeknown asphytoplanktonareeithersingle-celledorganisms
or shortChainsof identicalcells.With a life spanmeasurablein days,phyto-
planktonarenevertheless the mostimportantplantsin the sea.A singlebucket
ofseawatercanholdmillions.Diatomsanddino■agellates, someofwhichhave
prickly shapesreminiscentof snow■akes, dominatetheborealphytoplankton.
Drifting freelyin thesurfacelayerof the sea,thesetiny plantsharvestsunlight
and carbondioxide while producingboth oxygenand the carbohydrateson
whichlargeandsmallherbivoresrely.Phytoplanktonreproduceby dividingin
half, thengrowingagain.During thewinter, with low temperaturesandlight
levels,theyhavelittle energyfor reproduction.Whenlight, temperature,and
availablenutrientscreateconduciveconditionsin thespring,however,phyto-
planktonreproduceexplosively,bloominginto vastoceanicpastures.Satellites
carrying spectrometersto detectchlorophyllin the seahaverevealedphyto-
plankton pasturesin the North Atlantic of 60,000 squarekilometers,and
occasionally3 million squarekilometers.But the richestconcentrationsare
oftenabove■shingbanks,suchasthosein theGulfofMaine or theNorth Sea.14
Luxuriant meadowsof phytoplanktonnourish tiny, ■lter—feeding animals
knowncollectivelyaszooplankton.Larval■sh(ichthyoplankton)andinverte-
brates are among the zooplankton; so, too, are creatures such asarrow worms.
The most abundantanimalsin the world are found in zooplankton.Called
copepods,thesetiny crustaceansare the sizeof a grain of rice.Fmm the per-
spectiveof ■shermen,copepodsvie with euphausiidshrimp, a one—inch—long
22 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
omnivorethat eatsboth phytoplanktonandzooplankton,as the ■rst—among—
equalsin zooplankton.Copepodsgrazein sunlit surfacewaters.One cope—
pod, Calanus■nmarchius, is a favorite food ofherring, shad,menhaden,mack-
erel,baleenwhales,andothercommerciallyvaluablespecies.A matureright
whale, which usesbaleenplates to ■lter the water in its mouth, can eat as much
asoneton ofzooplanktondaily,muchof it copepods.Like right whales,Atlan—
theystrainzooplanktonfromthewatercolumn
tic herringarealso■lter—feeders:
with their gill rakers.Forcenturies■shermenwereba■ledaboutwhatherring
ate.The nakedeyesimplycannotidentify the contentsin the gut of a herring,
which are primarily zooplankton, and as late as the 15505,when the declining
Sk■norherring■sherypersistedin thestraitsbetweenSwedenandDenmark,
a Swedish observer noted that “This ■shhas virtually no intestine, or at any
rate a meagerone7so that nothing is found in its stomach.”It took develop-
mentof themicroscopeandplankton netsto determinethatwhereverherring
arefound,the seais swarmingwith copepods.Euphausiidshrimp, alsoa fa-
voritefoodofpelagic■shandbaleenwhales,generallylivein the samewaters.
(Pelagic■shlive on the surfaceor in the water column, not on the bottom or
on reefs.)For centuries■shermencalledeuphausiids“red feed”for the crim-
son ■ashon their transparentbodies;sincethe early twentieth century, eu-
phausiidshrimphavebeenknownby their Norwegianname,krill.l5
Like grassin a NewEnglandhay■eld,phytoplanktongenerallybloomstwice
a yearin the North Atlantic borealregion,oncein latewinter or earlyspring,
followedby a lesserbloom in late summer.This multiplying phytoplankton
nourishestheentirefoodweb:thetiny herbivorouszooplankton,including
co-
pepodsand larval ■sh;benthicinvertebratessuch as polychaeteworms and
brittle stars;■lter—feeders
suchasbaskingsharksandright whales;vastschools
ofbottom—dwelling hake,plaice,andcod;pelagic■shsuchasherringandmack-
erel; and crustaceanssuch as clamsand mussels.
As in New Englandand the CanadianAtlantic provinces,the European
littoral wasrifewith estuariesanda complexsuiteofintertidalhabitats.Flowing
into the coastal ocean were rivers rich in ■sh, ranging from Scottish salmon
streamslike the Speyt0 the mighty Rhine.Theseaquaticandmarinemicro-
environmentscontributedto the remarkableoverallproductivity of Europe’s
Atlantic coastal■sheriesfrom the Bayof Biscayto Scandinavia.In fact mea-
surementsof primary productivity,which ecologistsexpressasmilligramsof
carbonpersquaremeter,areremarkablysimilaralongnorthernEurope’scoast-
line andthat of northernNewEnglandandtheCanadianAtlantic provinces.
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 23
The primary productivity in thesouthernpart of theNorth Sea,for instance,
also known as the Wadden Sea,is virtually identical with that of the southern
Gulfof St.Lawrence.In otherwords,theability of thecoastaloceanto produce
biomass,rangingfrom plankton to whales,wasnot appreciablygreaterin the
NewWorldthanin theOld. Yetduring the 15005■shermen agreedthatcod■sh
were largerand morenumerousin Americanwaters,andthatbig ■shexisted
closer to shore.The abundanceand productivity of the westernAtlantic’s
borealecosystem appeareddramaticallyhigherthanthatoftheeasternAtlantic.
What explainedthediscrepancy?16
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS
Relyingprimarily on traditionalexcavationtechniques,includingpainstaking
sievingto retrievebonesandotherfaunalremains,aswell ason stablecarbon
andnitrogenisotopeanalysisof humanskeletalremains,archaeologists have
beenableto reconstructwhenvarioushumancommunitiesin Europebeganto
amountsof seafood.After the Mesolithic
consumesigni■cantlyincreasing
period (10,000—5,000 radiocarbonyearsB.P.[beforepresent]),seafoodcon—
sumptionin regionsaroundtheNorth Seabasindeclinedsigni■cantly,not to
resumeagainin a major way until about 1000A.D.WesternEuropeans’new
orientationto sea■shat that timemarkeda dramaticturning point in their re-
lationshipwiththesea.17
Evidenceindicatesthatuntil about1000A.D.most■shconsumedin West—
ernEuropewerelocallyavailablefreshwaterspeciessuchaspike,perch,bream,
tench, and trout, in addition to anadromous and catadromous species.Anad-
romous ■shsuch as salmon, sturgeon, and shad are born in freshwater rivers
or streams,but migrate to the ocean,wherethey spendmost of their lives,
beforereturning to rivers to spawn.Eels,somethingof a biologicalmystery,
alsowere eatenregularlyin ancientand medievalEurope.Eels are catadro-
mous■sh.Born in the SargassoSea,they ascendrivers as tiny, translucent
“elvers”(juveniles)to spendtheir entirelivesin freshor brackishwater,until
it is time to return to the seafor their once-a-lifetimespawning.Anadromous
andcatadromousspeciesall shareda momentin their life cyclesduring which
theycouldbe trappedeasilyby people■shingfrom the safetyof river banks,
an apparentlyprovidentialdispensationoffood from the deep-seaseato the
dooryard. Ancient and early—medieval inhabitants of the British Isles and
the Continent concentrated their efforts on freshwater and anadromous ■sh,
24 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
essentiallyignoring plentiful schoolsof sea■shin closeproximity to their
shores.18
Archaeologicalexcavationsfrom the Low Countries con■rmthis story.
Excavatedprehistoricandprotohistoricsitesin Belgiumcontainthebonesof
freshwater ■sh, but not sea ■sh. Until the middle of the tenth century some
marine mollusks, but no marine ■sh, were consumed in Ghent, one of the
majormedievalcitiesin Belgium.Fromthe middle of the tenth t0 the endof
the twelfth century, however, sea ■sh rose in importance in householders’
diets. In fact archaeologicalexcavationsrevealthat ■at■shsuch as ■ounder
and plaice were the ■rstmarine■shto be regularlyconsumed,followedby
cod,and■nallyby herring.Flat■sharemoreeasilycaughtthancod 0r herring
becausetheyspendconsiderabletimein shallowestuaries,suchasthose■ank-
ing the coastsof theLow Countries.Capturing■at■shrequireslesssophisti-
catedtechnologythan that necessaryfor herring 0r cod; they canbe speared
in shallow water. Around the turn of the millennium Flemish ■shermen,like
thosein England,began to expand their efforts into coastalwatersin the
southernNorth Sea.Marine■shwere■rsttradedinland from coastalregions,
initially to growing urban populationsalongthe ScheldeRiver,and several
centurieslater alongthe Meuse.By about 1300almostall ■sheatenin major
citiessuchasGhentor Antwerp weresea■sh.19
Of courseRomansoldiersandadministratorshadbroughttheir appetitefor
oysters,■sh,and the zesty■shsauceknown asgarum whenthey conquered
GaulandBritain at thebeginningof theChristianera(50 B.C.to 50 A.D.),along
of lead or ■redclay.Mussels,cockles,limpets,
with barbedhooksand net—sinkers
whelks,andoystersappearto havebeena considerable part of theRomans’diet
at thevilla of Llantwit Major.But thosewereexceptionsto the rule. Seafood
generallywasnot harvestedin westernEuropeon a largescalethroughoutthe
eraof theRomanconquestandthe ■rstmillennium0f theChristianera.Most
peoplein Britain andon theContinent,includingthosewholived nearthe sea,
ateprotein originatingprimarily from terrestrialcreatures0r freshwater■sh.
Evenon OrkneyandShetland,thenorthernislesoff Scotland,whereonemight
expectsea-girtresidentsto turn to the sea,■shandmarinemammalswerenot
exploitedvery intensivelybeforetheninth or tenth century.Fishbonesthat re-
mainin kitchenmiddensarefrom smallinshorespecies,the sort thatcouldbe
caughtwith simplegearandwithout muchrisk to the■sher.Moreover,notea
teamof archaeologists, “Stableisotopeanalysisof humanbonecollagenalso
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 25
indicatesthat marineproteinwasa negligiblecomponentof theNorthernIsles
dietatthistime.”20
Viking invaders,thoseseafarersnonpareilfrom the
pagannorth, became
■shmongers to Britain andtheContinent,providingtechnologyandexpertise
thatmadedeep-sea■shingpossible.As earlyastheeighthcentury Scandina-
vianswerecatching,drying, anddistributing cod■shfromtheNorwegianSea
in a precommercial“web ofobligation andexchange.”That wouldhavebeen
air-dried cod preservedwithout salt, known as stock■sh.It kept for
years.
Stock■shbecamethe stapleof Viking civilizationsand the food
sourcesup-
porting their notoriouslylongvoyages.And it wasthe■rst ■shtraded
sea over
extendeddistancesin northern Europe,predating the HanseaticLeague’s
herring business.By the twelfth century,NorseChieftainshadinaugurated
a
genuinecommercein stock■sh.BythenViking economicnotions—once pred-
icatedon honorandpower—were beingrecastin termsofaccumulatingwealth.
This transformationwas acceleratedby an emerginginternational
system
centeringuponbankingandcredit,andby theViking diasporathat
sawScan-
dinavian settlement in the Faroes, Shetlands, Orkneys, Hebrides, Ireland,
Iceland,andGreenland,in additionto their conquestandcolonizationofparts
of England and France, where “Northmen” became the “Normans” of Nor-
mandy.Dried cod, oncethe ration of choicefor marauding
paganwarriors,
insinuateditself into the menuof everydaypeopleduring the Middle Ages.
CatholicEuropeansobservingdaysof abstinenceincreasinglyrelied dried
on
codandclamored
formore.21
After the arrival of Viking settlersin the Orkneys,which occurredcirca
850—950A.D.,sea-■shingand consumption ofsea ■shincreased noticeably. In
York, England, sea-■shingbegan circa 975—1050;in Norwich, between the
latetenthandlateeleventhcenturies.Increasedconsumptionofseafoodbegan
in EynshamAbbey,in Oxfordshire,betweenthelateeleventhandearlytwelfth
centuries.While a Scotsherring ■sheryexistedin the mid-900s,exporting
herring t0 the Netherlands,the beginningof relativelylarge-scale ■shing
sea
in Englandand the Low Countries, notably for herring and gadoids(cod,
haddock,hake,etc.)beganin earnestonly around 1000AD. It is signi■cant
that the Anglo-Saxonlanguageof pre-NormanEnglanddid not
evenhavea
word for cod.22
Viking marinersleft their mark on Europeand the North Atlantic islands
in notoriousfashion;the marktheyleft on theliving
oceanis lesswell known.
26 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
Norsecolonistsinvolvedin settlementof fragile island ecosystemswerere—
sponsiblefor signi■cantlocalizeddepletionson or nearsomeof thoseislands,
affectingthe baselineof what cameto be considerednormal.Settlersdisem-
barkingfrom Viking shipsin Icelandduring theninth centuryapparentlyex-
terminatedthe local populationof walrus quite rapidly.Vikings latermoved
on to harvest considerable numbers ofwalrus from the Greenland herds, and
maintainedpressureon herdsin northernNorway.The abundanceand geo-
graphicdistributionofwalrushadshrunkby theendoftheViking Age.Kitchen
remainsfrom Norse settlementsin Iceland and the FaroeIslandsindicate
substantial harvests of seabirds, which came ashore to nest on the rocks and
cliffs. As two archaeologistsnote, “The two early Icelandicsitesappearto
re■ectthe drawdownof the massivenaturalcapitalrepresentedby the previ-
ouslyunharvestedbird coloniesof the south coastat a time whenthe small
herds and ■ocksof imported domesticatescould not yet fully provision
the■rstcolonists.”The birds huntedwereprimarily Alcidae,membersof the
aukfamily.The birds mayhavebeenharvestedsustainablyin the sensethat
their populationsdid not crash,like thoseof the walrus, but it is likely that
continued human hunting (and egg collecting) reducedpopulations from
what theyhadbeenbeforethe arrival of humanpredators.At thejunkarins-
■otti Viking site in the Faroes, 30 percent of the fauna] remains were from
birds, primarily puffins. Faroeseislanderscontinuedto harvestpuf■nswell
into the Middle Agesand beyond, an indication that the birds were being
huntedsomewhatsustainably,althoughtheir numberswereprobablydimin-
ishedfrom what they had been.With birds and walrus, and perhapswith
sealsin some locations, Viking hunters shifted the baseline ofwhat was con—
siderednormal.23
Viking voyagerst0 Vinland left a differentsort of biologicalsignature.The
commonEuropeanperiwinkle, which arrived asan invasivespeciesin Nova
Scotiaduring the nineteenthcentury, and which is now the most abundant
snail alongthe rocky shoresof New Englandand NovaScotia,■rstcrossed
the Atlantic asa hitchhiker on a Viking longship.Archaeologistsexcavated
the ■rstAmerican periwinkles from the Viking settlementat L’Anse aux
Meadows,in northernNewfoundland.TravelingwestacrosstheAtlanticwith
LeifEricson andhis crew,probablyon ballaststones,thoseperiwinklesmade
the voyagebut failed to reproducesuccessfully—a stillborn invasion.Never-
theless,that invasionindicateshow biologicalchangesto the seawereunder
wayasearlyastheMiddle Ages.Anotherinvertebrateapparentlytransported
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 27
by Vikings eastwardacrossthe Atlantic beganto competesuccessfullywith
indigenousspeciesin coastalEuropeanecosystems. The softshellclam,Mya
arenaria, traveled from North America to the North Seaand Baltic, where it
had becomeestablishedby the 12005.Radiocarbondating of softshellclam
shellsfrom Denmarkindicates“without doubt” thatthoseclamspredateC0-
lumbus’voyagein 1492.Unlike the movementofperiwinkles, this transplant
appearsto havebeenarrangedintentionallyby humans.Longbeforethe“Co-
lumbianexchange”led to thetwo-directionalbiologicaltransferof terrestrial
plants, animals, and microbes between the Old World and the New, ships
carrying marineorganismson long voyageswerebeginningto reshapelocal
coastalecosystems.
After arrivingin theBalticandNorth Seas,softshellclams
beganto competewith other mollusks,such as the commonediblecockle.
They also becameavailable to local harvesters.But thosebiological invasions,
undeniablyintriguing, werevery mucha sideshowin theinterrelatedhistories
of humansand the seaduring the Middle Ages.The real action wason the
■shingbanksandin the■shmarketsofwesternEurope.24
FormedievalEuropeanslife without ■shwould havebeenunimaginable,and
by the endof theeleventhcentury that ■shincreasinglyoriginatedin the sea.
Dried, smoked, salted, or fresh, ■sh was the staff of life in Roman Catholic
societies.“Abstinence,atonement,fastingandpenancelay at thecoreofChris-
tian belief,” as Brian Faganhasexplained,and “from the earliesttimes■sh
had a specialassociationwith suchpractices.”On Christendom’sholy days,
including all Fridaysand Saturdays,the six weeksof Lent, and the vigils of
important festivalssuch asChristmas Eve,abstinenceand fasting were required,
supposedlydampeningbelievers’carnallust, heighteningtheir spirituality,
and helping to purify their souls.Meatlessdaysof atonementandpenitence
were de rigueur. The ■eshof ■sh,however (loosely de■ned to include seals,
whales, seabirds, and even beaver,since Pliny’s Natural History, a de■nitive
workin medievalEurope,explainedthat“the beaverhasa ■sh’stail”), wasap—
propriatefor fastdays.Beaverin Englandwerean earlyecologicalcasualty:
penitentfolk searchingout lawful meatfor ■shdaysextirpatedthem.Seabirds
sufferedas well. As a British food historian explains,“roastedpu■inswere
part of the ■shfeastheld for the enthronementof the Archbishopof Canter-
bury in March 1504/5.”Such exceptions, or loose de■nitions of ■sh,however,
were not typical. For the mostpart, actual■shand eelswere the protein of

28 EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
DEPLETED
Choiceon fast days,especially for thosein aristocratic or monastic households,
andfor themiddling sort.25
By the late Middle Ages,crudely saltedherring was the preeminenttable
■shin Europe, accessibleevento commonpeople.Herring were consumed
modernAmerica.An
asubiquitouslyin medievalEnglandashamburgersarein
extensiveherring■sheryexistedin thestraitsbetween what arenow Denmark
andsouthernSweden,controlledby merchantsof theHanseaticLeague.Her-
ring fairs on the eastcoast ofEngland, such as those at Whitby and Yarmouth,
with thearrival
wereestablishedin thetwelfth century.Timed to correspond
of shoalsofspawningherring, thelargestof thosefairs attractedthousandsof
transient■shers,traders,and processors.In 1086the monksof Ely collected
received 68,000
24,000 herring in rent from the town of Dunwich; the king
herringfromthesametown.Barrelsofsalted“white” herringandsmoked“red”
herring sat in cellars, and traveled far inland. Cod, haddock, hake, whiting,
and pollock (all membersof the gadoidfamily of white-■eshed■shes)were
alsoregularlyeatenduring the late medievalperiod, alongwith skates,rays,
salmon,mackerel,and mullet.26
Large-scalesea-■shingbegan not only becauseof the adventof Viking
technology,but alsobecausefreshwater■sherieswere declining in western
EuropeandBritain. During thelateMiddle Agesgrowinghumanpopulations
exerted pressure on ■sh stocks in lakes, streams, and rivers. Deforestation,
dams, and disposal into watercourses of sewage,domestic animal waste, and
industrial effluentcombined to degradefreshwater■shhabitats. Milldams
stoppedmigratory■shandslowedrunning water.As agriculturalsilt settled
and waterswarmed,streamsbecameunsuitablefor somespecies’spawning.
Yet ■shingpressurecontinued.King Philip IV of Francelamentedin 1289
that “everyriver andwatersideof our realm,largeand small,yieldsnothing
due to the evil of the ■shersandthe devicesof [their] contriving.” Unableto
of eachyear,medievalCatho—
consumemeatduring approximatelyone—third
lics turned to sea■shafterfreshwater■shhad beendepletedby over■shing
andhabitatdegradation.27
Extensive■xed—gear ■sheriesexistedin the rivers that markedmanorial
boundaries.Typically theboundaryline ran downthe centerof theriver.To
accommodate proper allocationof resources,and to permit vesseltraf■c,■sh
weirsusuallywerebuilt from the shoreonly to the centerof the stream.“Fre-
quentlylong stretchesof majorrivers would contain a successionof contem-
medievalist.
porary ■sheriesbelonging to different manors,” notes one
I
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 29
Weirs consistingof stakesand netspredominated,thoughtherewerebrush
weirs as well, along with basketweirs, and variations known as kiddles. Some
of the “engines,”ascontemporariesreferredto permanent■shingstructures,
were massive.Constructed of heavy timbers, to which nets were secured,such
engineslitteredthewaterways.28
By the early thirteenth century they had becomethe target of punitive
legislation.In 1224—25 Parliamentorderedthat “wears shall be utterly put
down throughall England,exceptby the sea-coast.”In 1285,during the
...
reignof EdwardI, the “SalmonPreservationAct” imposedpenaltiesfor tak-
ing youngsalmonwith netsor rnill-enginesfrom the“midst oprril unto the
Nativity of S.John the Baptist.” In a re■ectionof ongoingconcernsabout
salmon stocks”sustainability, the act.was recon■rmed in 1389and 1393.The
1389 act speci■cally banned the use of the “stalker,” a ■ne-meshednet that
capturedjuvenile salmonandlampreys.An “Act RemedyingAnnoyancesin
the Four Great Rivers ofEngland, Thames, Severn,Ouse, and Trent,” passed
in 1346—47,targeted permanently installed ■sheriesapparatus that impeded
Fiveyearslaterit wasfollowedby anorderthatall “Wears,
vessels’freepassage.
Mills, Stanks, Stakes,and Kiddles” that disturbed ships and boatsin the great
riversofEngland shouldbe“utterly pulled down” and not replaced.This act
wasreiteratedfrequentlyfor morethan a centuryfollowing 1370,a clearre■ec-
tion that it wasineffectiveandgenerallyunenforced.The imagethat remains
is oneof narrow rivers,oncehighwaysto spawninggroundsfor salmon,stur—
geon, shad, lampreys, eels, and sea trout, choked and clogged by ■sh traps.
The deviceswell upstreamgenerallytook freshwaterspeciessuchasperch,
pike, roach, and bream, but for much of the length of the rivers anadromous
specieswereremovedin greatnumbers.Nearthemouthsof thegreatrivers,in
their estuaries,weirs routinely trappedporpoise,■ounders,herring, skates,
smelt,andothermarine■sh.”
In addition to thosein rivers,primitive corral-shapedweirs,constructedof
brushwood fences or stone walls, had been built in estuariesand on beaches
in Englandsince at leastthe tenth century. As the tide receded,■shwere
trappedin theenclosures.Betweenthe years956and1060,BathAbbeypos-
sesseda largeestateat Tidenham,in Gloucestershire, which includedat least
104■shweirs, most of them on the Severn.Consisting ofstakes driven into the
sand or mud, with nets stretched between them, thesekiddles could be hun-
dredsof feetlong, creatingan effectivebarrier in a river or alonga beach.By
thethirteenth centurytheseforeshoreweirswereparticularly commonoff the
3O DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
coast of Essex and in the Exe estuary, where plaice, dab, sole, and ■ounder
weretargeted.30
The EssexandNorth Kentestuariesalsosupportedproductiveoyster■sh-
eries. The Colne estuary had provided oystersparticularly prized by the
Romans.By the thirteenth century Colchesterwas assertingits rights to the
Colne estuaryoyster■shery.Oysters,cockles,and musselsappearin medi-
evalaccountsfrom thetenth century,whenAelfric, Abbott of Cerne(Dorset),
noted them among ■shermen’scatches, to the ■fteenth century, when Foun-
tainsAbbeypurchasedoystersat York, Hull, andScarborough.Oysterswere
alsoan importantnaturalfeatureof the Fal estuary,thelocationof Falmouth,
one of Britain’s ■nestharbors, and a center for trade and ■shingin Cornwall
from medievaltimes.”
Commercialoyster■sheriesalsoexistedduring the twelfth andthirteenth
centuriesin the Wadden Sea,the coastalareaof the southern North Seastretch-
ing from theNetherlandsthroughGermanyto Denmark;andalongplaceson
the Frenchcoast,too. Oystersare easilygatheredin shallows.As far backas
the era of Romandominationof the Mediterranean,oysterswereone of the
■rstestuarinespeciesdepletedby humans.The impact on the environment
wasseriousbecauseoysterreefsprovidehabitatfor otherorganisms,aswell as
erosioncontrol.Evenmoreimportantly,oysters■lterthe watercolumn.Each
oysterpumpswateracrossitsbodywith thousandsor hundredsof thousandsof
pulsing, hairlike cilia, extracting phytoplankton, bacteria, and debris. Oysters
eattheediblepart anddeposittheinorganicsedimentnearby,removingit from
activesuspensionin the watercolumn.A singleoystercan■ltertento twenty
gallonsof water per day.A largeoysterreef,coveringacres,is ableto ■ltera
hugevolumeof water,contributing to light penetrationandestuarineproduc-
tivity. Sponges,mussels,barnacles,and other ■lter—feeders
do similar work, but
oystersaremoreeffective.Removinglargenumbersof oystersfrom an estuary
degrades waters.32
thoseestuarine
Commercialsea■sheriesexpandedrapidly in Europeafterthe turn of the
millennium, led by re■nements in the herring ■eet.By 1300,England’seast
coast■sheries“constituteda complexandwidely dispersedbusinessactivity,
the scaleof which was immenseby medievalstandards.”Marine ■shingin
southwesternEnglandintensi■edconsiderablyduring thelatefourteenthcen-
tury. Bythe■fteenthcentury■shexportsfromtheportsofDevonandCornwall
surpassed thoseof everyotherEnglishregion.This newlyenergizedsouthwest-
ern ■sheryemployedmultiple technologiesand targetednumerousspecies,
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 31
overshadowing herring asthedominantfood■sh.During theearlyfourteenth
century,99 percentof the ■shshipmentsarriving by seaat Exeterwereher-
ring; a century and a half later,herring accountedfor only 29 percentof ■sh
imports,and twenty—two varietiesof ■shwerearriving in Exeter.Meanwhile,
ascommercial■sheriesdrovetheengineof economicexpansionin southwest-
ern Englandduring thefourteenthand ■fteenthcenturies,theDutchherring
■sherydevelopedexponentially,built on newtechniquesthatallowedherring
to beprocessedandbarreledaboard■shingships.Without theneedto return
to shore for salting or pickling their catch, Dutch busses,as they were called,
couldremainat seafor weeksor evenmonthsat a stretch,followingtheshoals
of migratingNorth Seaherring.33
speciesof ■shwereavailablein Devonmarkets,and
By 1630,eighty—three
WestCountrymenwereroutinely■shingall aroundtheBritish
well-capitalized
Isles, and ranging as far a■eld as Norway, Iceland, Newfoundland, and the
seamenand naturalistssuch as
Gulf of Maine. By then, when Renaissance
Anthony Parkhurst, Captain john Smith, and james Rosier were describing
lush borealestuarieson the Americanshore,the assaulton Europeanboreal
estuaries,rivers,andcoastalseashadpersistedfor centuries.During theearly
16305,when William Wood wrote glowingly about marineproductivity in
Massachusetts Bay,Edward Sharpereferred to “pernitious Trinker—men,”
whoworkedfrom smallboatsto “destroyetheRiverof Thames,by killing the
Fry and smallFish there,evenall that comesto the Net, beforeit beeeyther
meateor Marketable.”34
SomeEuropeanspecieswere being ■shedsustainably.During the early
seventeenth centurythetotalannualproductionof theNorth Seaherring■sh-
ery typicallyrangedfrom60,000to 80,000metrictons,but it neversurpassed
95,000 tons. While the Dutch were responsible for about 80 percent of these
herring landings, Danish, Scottish, and Norwegian ■shermenalso contrib-
in light of estimatesof North Seaherring’s spawning
uted. When assessed
stock biomass made in 2005, the seventeenth-century landings should have
■shery.35
beenwellwithinthelimitsof asustainable
Other speciesand the systemasa whole were not faring so well. Despite
spottyevidence,certainindicatorsexistregardingthestateofsixteenth-century
ecosystemsin the North Sea,the English Channel, and the Bay of Biscay,the
points of origin for mostvoyagesto America.The sizeof the■ocksof migra-
tory waterfowl,themagnitudeof oysterreefs,theextentof springtimespawning
runs of anadromous■sh,the presenceor absenceof greatwhalesin inshore
 SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
32 DEPLETED EUROPEAN
■shermanto land cod or
waters,andthe effort necessaryfor a hook—and-line
haddock:thesewere the unspokenbaselinesassumedas natural by chroni-
clersdepartingfor the westernperipheryof theborealNorth Atlantic. While
precisemeasurements of thoselate medievaland early modern systemsare
lacking,theoverallpatternsareclear.
Biologistsknow that the coastalwatersof Europeare appropriatehabitatfor
severalspeciesof whales.The North Sea,with its high productivity,is espe-
cially hospitable:it undoubtedlyhad a densepopulation of whalesat one
time. Romanresidentsof the British Isleswere quite familiar with the “Bri-
tannicwhale,” so namedby the RomanpoetJuvenal.That familiarity could
only haveexistedfor a speciescommonlyseennearthe shore,and onediffer-
theright whale.Bythemedi—
ent fromwhalesin theMediterranean—possibly
evalperiod,Basque,Flemish,andNormanWhalerswerepursuingwhalesfrom
shore-based operations.Basqueshadbeenkilling whalesin the Bayof Biscay
sincethe eleventhcentury,andpossiblylonger.At onepoint the right whale
(Eubalanmaglacialis) was known as the “Biscayanwhale”; later huntedin
thefar north, it wasalsocalledthe“nordcaper.”Perceptionsthat stockswere
decreasingcausedKing Alfonso XI of Castileto reducehis tax on Lekeitio
Whalersin 1334,thoughevidencesuggeststhattheBasqueswerestill pursuing
right whalesin theEnglishChannelup to thesixteenthcentury.Normanand
FlemishWhalershuntedright whalesand/orgraywhalesin theEnglishChan—
nel and the North Sea,andwhalemeatappearedregularlyin medievalmar-
ketsin thetownsofBoulogne,Nieuwpoort,Damme,andCalais,amongothers.
A surveyof English■sheriescompiledin 1580,however,suggeststhatby then
the right whalestockhadbeenmuch reduced.The surveymadeno mention
oflocal whales,but indicatedthatEnglishmenroutinelytraveled“to the coast
of RushetowardsMuskovieandSt. nycolas”for summerwhaling.The Inter-
nationalWhaling Commissionhasreportedthat by “the ■rsthalf of the 17th
century . . . the local [European] population of E. glacialis was already
severelyaffected.”This circumstanceexplains why the ReverendRichard
Mather, approaching the New England coast in 1635,delighted in “the multi-
tude of greatwhales,which now wasgrown ordinary and usual to behold.”
Travelerslike Matherand experiencedmarinersnotedthat the ecosystemin
thewesternAtlantic wasorganizeddifferentlybecauseof thepresenceofgreat
whales.”
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 33
Harbor sealsand gray sealswere once commonin the North Seaand
aroundtheBritish Isles.Grayseals(Halichoerusgrypus)aremuchlargerthan
harbor seals;bulls can exceedeight feetand weigh over 600 pounds.After
birth, gray sealpups stayon shorefor severalweeks,wherethey arevulnera-
ble to hunters.In the Netherlandsand Germanysubfossilremainsof gray
sealsaremorecommonthan thoseofharbor seals.Archaeologistshaveexca-
vatedgraysealremainsfrom at leasteightsitesin theNetherlandsalone,rang-
ing in datefrom about 2000 B.C.to the early Middle Ages.The scarcityof
reports on the presenceof gray sealsin the southeasternNorth Sea,off the
Low Countries,since1500suggeststhat the populationwas virtually wiped
out throughhunting pressureby the endof the Middle Ages,eventhougha
small breedingpopulation remainedin the FaroeIslands.Europeanssub-
sequentlyencounteringvast herds of gray sealsand harbor sealsin boreal
North Americanwaterswere■abbergasted by their numbers.37
Eider ducks(Somateriamollisima),anotherborealspeciesoncecommon
in both the easternand westernAtlantic, may havebred throughouta large
part ofnorthernEuropeuntil theMiddle Ages.Eidersarethelargestandmost
common seaduck in Europe, and a resource prized for meat, eggs, and their
unsurpassedeiderdown. As early as the seventhcentury, BishopCuthbert
and his monks attemptedto protect eidersnesting on Lindisfarne,off the
northeastcoastof England.Eidersareparticularlyvulnerableto humanpre-
dation.Mostseabirdsshedtheir feathersoneat a time,replacingworn onesin
rotation. Eidersmolt all at once,and thus are rendered■ightlessfor several
weeksin August,duringwhichtimetheyraftin vastnumbers.Huntersin boats
cancapitalizeon eiders’■ightlessnessduring themoltby herdingthedefense-
lessduckstowardchoicespotson the beachfor killing. Narrow ravinesand
funnel-shapedgullies were ideal, but evenopen beachescould be madeto
serve.Evidencesuggeststhathumanpressureon eiderseradicatedthespecies
frommuchof theNorth Seaby theendof theMiddle Ages.While eiderswere
especiallyvalued,othercoastalbirds,especiallycoloniallybreedingseabirds,
were likewise exploited for feathers,down, meat, and eggsfor millennia. Never
existedin adiminishedstate.38
extirpated,theynevertheless
The clearestevidenceby far about the degradedstate of late medieval
Europeanestuariesandrivers concernsanadromous■sh—theEuropeansea
sturgeon,theshads,theWhite■sh family,andthecloselyrelatedsalmonandsea
trout families.Sturgeonbonesrecoveredby the thousandsfrom archaeologi-
cal excavationsin the southernBaltic revealthat betweenthe tenth and the

34 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
thirteenthcenturiestheaveragesizeof sturgeonlandeddecreased
considerably—
indicating a population in which ■shwere being caughtbeforegrowing to
theirfull size.Otherrecordsshowthat sturgeonlandingsin theLow Countries
likewisedecreased sizefromtheeleventhto thefourteenthcenturies.
in average
In lowerNormandythenumberof salmonlandedfromsmallriversdecreased
signi■cantlybetween1100and 1300.Plowagriculture, siltation, milldams, warm-
ing waters, and over■shingall took a toll on salmon,which, like trout, sturgeon,
shad,and White■sh,thrive in clear,well-oxygenated,cold, rapidly moving
streams.As one historian hasnoted, “Even in wealthyParisianhouseholds
and prosperousFlemishmonasteries,consumptionof once-favored sturgeon,
salmon, trout, and White■shshrank to nothing by around 1500.”39
Latemedievaland earlymodern■sheriesclearlywere depletingestuarine
and river systemslike the Rhine and the Thames,evenas they were ■shing
herringsustainably.The moreopen-endedquestionconcernsnorthernEuro-
pean■sheries’impacton stocksof cod,ling, hake,andothersea'■sh.Reliable
quantitativedatasimplydo not existfor mostlatemedievalandearlymodern
■sheries. However,biologiststodayunderstandthat, amongmanystockssub-
ject to ■shing,the largest■share caught■rst.Continued■shingreducesthe
averagesizeand ageof individuals,andthe ■shrespondby maturingearlier.
Younger,smaller■shbegin to spawn.It is axiomaticthat among■sh,larger
femalesproducemoreeggs,oftenexponentiallymoreeggs.So a reductionin
spawningsizecan impedereproduction.While it is impossibleto statewith
anycertaintywhetheror notmostEuropeansea■shstockswerebeingaffected,
it is Clearthatthe systemasawholehadbeensigni■cantlydegradedby 1500,as
measured by the depletion of whales, seals, seabirds, and anadromous ■sh.
Fivehundredyearsof ■shinghadchangedthe natureof coastalEuropeaneco-
systems,and affectedthe baselinesfor what contemporariesassumedto be
normal.40
ASSESSING ABUNDANCE
When in August 1527 the Englishman John Rut trimmed the sheets on his
baggyflax sailsandsteeredthroughthe narrow mouthof St.]ohn’sharborin
Newfoundlandto ■nd“elevensailof Normans,oneBreton,and two Portugal
barks, and all ■shing,” he confronted the westernmost outpost of a network of
European ■shermen,■shmongers,and ■sh markets that stretched from the
NorwegianArctic Circle to theMediterraneanSea,frominland citiesnearthe
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 35
Alps to islandoutpostssuchastheFaroes,from■shinggroundsin the expan-
siveshallowsseawardof theLow Countriesto thosesurroundingNewfound-
land,that greatrockrising out of thewesternAtlantic.just thirty yearsbefore,
known to EnglishmenasJohnCabot,
a VenetiannamedZoaneCaboto,better
anda crewof abouteighteenmenhadreachedNewfoundlandaboardtheship
Matthew, ownedby Bristol merchants.Except for the voyagesthat had re-
sulted in a brief Scandinavian settlementin L’Anse aux Meadows, Newfound-
land, subsequently abandoned around the year 1000, Cabot’s voyage in 1497
is theearliestknown connectionbetweenthe eastandwestsidesof theNorth
Atlanticborealregion.ShortlyaftertheMatthewreturnedto England,anItalian
letter about the voyageto the duke of
envoy to the English court wrote a
Milan. “This Messer Zoane, as a foreigner, and a poor man, would not have
obtainedcredence,had it not beenthat his companions,who are practically
all Englishandfrom Bristol,testi■edthathe spokethe truth. . . . They assert
the
that the seathere is swarming with ■sh,which can be taken not only with
These same English, his com-
net, but in basketslet down with a stone. . . .
panions,saytheycould bring so many‘■shthat this kingdomwould haveno
further needof Iceland,from whichplacetherecomesavery greatquantityof
the■shcalledstock■sh.”41
During the fourteenthand ■fteenthcenturiesthe heraldic symbolof the
powerfulHanseaticLeagueprominentlydisplayedimagesof stock■sh.With
the Viking ascendancylong past by then, Hanse merchantsmonopolized
stock■shdistribution in what are now Germany, Poland, the Low Countries,
France,andEngland.But interloperswereeagerfor a shareof the action.So
whenjohn Cabot and his crew reconnoitered western Atlantic waters in 1497,
indeed,
they saw its ecosystemin terms of the international ■shmarket. Here,
Icelandirrelevant.
wasa storeof ■shthat would make
Similar in most ways to northern Europe’s coastalecosystem,though
clearlybetter stockedwith cod, the northwestAtlantic neverthelesshad its
distinguishingwonders._]acquesCartierwasamongthe■rstto delineatethose
differences.As comfortablewith a quill pen in his hand aswith a pine deck
and
under his feet, Cartier had the sensibilities of a man simultaneously active
meditative.No oneof his generationhadlived moreintimatelywith the seaor
studied it more devoutly. Born in 1491in St. Malo, an ancient Breton town
walled off from the threatening ocean on Which it depended, Cartier knew
that the seakept its secrets.By the time the two shipsof “sixty tons burden
each,mannedin all with sixty-onemen”that he commandedslippedthrough
36 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
the narrow seagateof St. Malo, headingfor Newfoundlandand the Gulf of
St. Lawrence in 1534, Cartier had thousands of ocean miles under his belt,
including—itappears—previous crossingsto BrazilandNewfoundland,aswell
asinnumerablecoastingand■shingvoyagesin Europe.
No onewas better suited to report on seabirdcoloniesin the Gulf of St.
Lawrence,wherehe found “a great number of tinkers [razorbills, a smaller
relativeof the greatauk]andpuf■nswhich havered beaksandfeetandmake
their nestsin holesundertheearthlike rabbits”; 0n “the best■shingpossible
for big cod” alongthe westcoastof Newfoundland;or on the “large quantity
ofrnackerelthey[Mi’kmaqpeople]hadcaughtneartheshorewith nets.”Keen
observerandwell—prepared marinerthathe was,Cartiernevertheless held no
illusionsthathe coulddeterminethe outcomeof his voyage,or guaranteehis
return. His fatalismwas tinged by his sensethat a man then “could neither
rationallycomprehendnor activelycontrol theworld in which helived.” Re-
naissanceEuropeans’relationswith thenonhumannaturalworld werecondi-
tioned by this sensibility,by this notion that nature was in■niteand over-
whelming,andthathumankind’sattemptsto tameor improveit werelikely to
be futile.42
During September 1535in the St. Lawrence River, as Cartier explained, his
men“discovereda speciesof ■sh,which noneofus had everseenor heardof.
This ■shis as largeasa porpoisebut hasno ■n.It is very similar to a grey-
houndaboutthebodyandheadandis aswhite assnow. The peopleof the
...
country call themAdhothuysand told us they arevery good to eat.” Breton
mariners from St. Malo knew the seaand its life, but the beluga, often called
thewhite whale—amarinemammalfrom twelveto sixteenfeetin lengthand
distinctive for its lack of a dorsal ■n—wasprimarily an Arctic speciesand
rarely seenin the watersofWesternEurope.It seemedworthy of comment,a
distinguishinghallmarkof the westernAtlantic.43
Also unknown in Europeanwaterswas the ungainly horseshoecrab, an
invertebratecommonalongthe beachesand in the shallows0f the Gulf of
Maine. In 1605 Samuel (16Champlain, the most fastidious observer of New
Franceand the American coast,marveledat them. Champlainencountered
hundredsofspeciesofbirds, ■sh,mammals,andinvertebrateson his voyages
betweenCapeCod and the St. LawrenceRiver,including the Bayof Fundy.
He rarelybotheredwith detaileddescriptionsof borealcreatureswell known
in France.The horseshoecrab’soutlandishnesscaughthis imagination.It
was “a ■shwith a shell on its back like a tortoise,” he wrote, with intense curi-
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 37
osity,“yet different;for it hasalongthemedianline arow oflittle pricklesco—
loured like a dead leaf, as is the rest of this ■sh.At the end of this shell is an—
other,which is smallerandborderedby very sharppoints.The lengthof the
tail variesaccordinglyasthe■shis largeor small,andwith theendof it these
people[Natives]tip their arrows. The largestI sawwasa foot in breadth
...
andafootandahalflong.”44
Champlainfound themin greatabundancealongthe Maine coast,where
horseshoecrab eggsandlarvaewerean importantseasonalfood for otherin-
vertebrates, birds, and ■sh. Shorebirds such as dowitchers, sanderlings, and
sandpipersgorgedon horseshoecrab eggsin the spring, as did severalcrab
speciesand somegastropods,including whelks. Striped bass,eels,various
■ounders,and other sea■shfrequentingestuariesin the spring also con—
sumedprodigiousquantitiesof horseshoecrab eggsandlarvae.Though the
Frenchexplorer did not know it, this strange“■shwith a shell on its back
like a tortoise” contributedgreatlyto the signatureproductivity of the Gulf
of Maine.45
The “Morses 0r Seaoxen,” as another sailor referred to walruses in 1591,
likewiseneededexplanation.Exceptforoccasionalstragglerstheyhadnot been
seenfor centuriesin Europe:overhuntinghadreducedtheir range,squeezing
them to the far north in Norway and the Svalbardarchipelago.During the
sixteenthcenturyBasque,French,andEnglishsailorsencounteredvastherds
of walrus in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.Estimatesare that the gulf herd num-
bered 250,000 animals when Europeans arrived, while the SableIsland (Nova
Scotia) and Newfoundland herd numbered 125,000.If theseestimatesare ac-
curate, the combinedlive weight(biomass)of the region’swalrus herdswas
450,000 tons. Each of the 375,000 individual animals consumed on average
poundsof food per day,primarily benthicinvertebratessuchas
ninety—nine
clams, oysters, scallops7star■sh,and seasquirts.46
The Gulf of St. Lawrenceis a hugeestuary,providing a smorgasbordfor
creaturessuch as walrus. Its major oceanographicfeatureis the out■owof
freshwater from the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River, which moves
eastwardalongthenorth coastof the GaspéPeninsulaat tento twentynauti-
cal miles per day,acceleratingduring the ebb tide and slowingduring the
■oodtide. Subsurfaceupwellingof oceanwater that entersthe gulf through
the Straitsof BelleIsle and the CabotStrait contributessigni■cantlyto sus-
taining the current. The upwelling and constantmovementguaranteethat
nutrients are well dispersedthroughout a relativelyshallow water column
38 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
readilypenetratedby sunlight—perfectconditionsfor planktonreproduction.
Manymarineinvertebratesare■lter—feeders. Muchof theGulfofSt. Lawrence
provided a vastpantry for suchcreatures,similar to the Gironde estuaryin
southwesternFrance,or thesmallerestuariesfringing thesouthBrittany coast
with which CartierandChamplainwerefamiliar.Quahogs,scallops,oysters,
soft—shellclams, razor clams, cockles, whelks, and other mollusks thrived,
providing foodfor bottom-dwellingpredatory■shsuchascod,haddock,and
halibut, and alsofor walrus. A maturemalewalrus can weigh2,600pounds
and measuretwelvefeetin length. Suchan animaldoesnot havemanyene-
miesin the sea,but it needsto consumemorethan6 percentof its bodyweight
eachday,meaningthat eachof the “great beasts”that Cartier sawat Brion
Islandcouldneedto eatasmanyas7,000shell■shper day.47
Walrus werea striking componentof thenorthwestAtlantic ecosystemfor
Europeans,and were immediatelyrecognizedas a pro■tablesourceof oil,
leather,andivory.They werealsonovel.By thesixteenthcenturywalrushad
largelydisappearedfrom the collectiveconsciousness of Europeanmariners,
thoughcenturiesbefore,at the heightof the Viking Age(ca.750—1050 A.D.),
walrus ivory and inch—thick walrus hideshad beenprestigioustradegoods
throughoutmaritimeEurope.A walruscouldbe skinnedby startingnearthe
tail andpeelingthehide from theanimalin a continuousstrip aboutoneinch
wide, resultingin a one-inch-thickleatherrope of greatlength,and stronger
than any■berropeknown at thetime.Hide ropeshadbeencrucialfor rigging
Viking ships.“
Sailorswonderedaloudwhetherthesecumbersomeandfrighteningbeasts
were oxen, horses, lions, or ■sh. Cartier described them as “■sh in appear-
ancelike horseswhich goon land at night but in daytimeremainin thewater.”
EdwardHayes,who accompaniedSir HumphreyGilbert to Newfoundlandin
1583,tried desperatelyto capturethe essence of a walrus,drawingon the com-
parisonsat his disposal.He wrote,with wonderandconsiderableaccuracy,of
“a very lion to our seeming,in shape,hair andcolour,not swimmingafterthe
manerof a beastby moovingof his feete,but rather sliding upon the water
with hiswholebody(exceptingthelegs)in sight,neitheryet diving under,and
againerising above the water, as the manner is, of Whales, Dolphins, Tunise
[tunas],Porposes,and all other ■sh:but con■dentlyshewinghimselfabove
waterwithouthiding.”49
Sixteen years later at a small archipelagoin the Gulf of St. Lawrence,
anotherEnglishmanobservedwalrus,whichhecalled“SeaOxen sleepe
...a
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 39
upon therockes:butwhenwe approachednereunto themwith our boatethey
castthemselvesinto the seaandpursuedus with suchfurie as that wewere
glad to ■eefrom them.” Accounts published between 1591and 1600in French
and English revealed that walrus from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, known “in
Latin as BovesMarini,” were “very big: and hath two great teeth:and the
skinneofthem is like Buffesleather.”Whenbutcheredandrenderedtheypro-
duced “very sweet”oil, and their tusks could be “sold in England to the
combe& knife makers”for twice the price of ivory. Moreover,thosetusks,
when powdered, according to a “skilful Phisition” from Bristol, were “as
soveraigneagainstpoisonasany Unicorneshome.”50
For the mostpart, however,neitherthe novelty nor the magicalqualities0f
marineorganismsfrom thenorthwestAtlantic captivatedEuropeanmariners
so much as their familiarity and sheerabundance.On back—to-back
summer
days in 1597,for instance, the veteran sea captain Charles Leigh sailed into
a
marinecornucopiain the Gulf of St. Lawrencethe likes of which he could
barelyconceive.“In little more than an hour we caughtwith four hookstwo
hundredand■fty”cod,hewrote—arateslightlybetterthanonecodperminute
per hook. At the Bird Islands Leigh saw “such abundanceof Birds as is
almost incredible to report.” The gannets, murres, razorbills, pu■ins, and
others sat “there as thick as stoneslie in a pavedstreet.”Nearwhat is now
Sydney,Nova Scotia, he encountered “the greatest multitude of lobsters that
weeverheardof;for we caughtat onehaulwith a little drawnetaboveonehun-
dredandforty.” Accountafteraccountreiteratedthe samewide-eyedsenseof
wonderat theborealocean’sproductivityjohn Breretonnotedthatin “■veor
sixehours” on a singleMaydayin 1602,undertheleeof CapeCod, “we had
pesteredour ship sowith Cod■sh,that we threwnumbersof themouer—boord
againe.” Shell■shabounded, too: “Scalops, Muscles,Cockles, Lobster, Crabs,
Oisters,andWilks, exceedinggoodandvery great.”Breretonwasalmostapol-
ogetic.“But not to cloy you with particularrehearsalof suchthingsasGod &
nature hath bestowed on theseplaces,” he wrote, “in comparison whereof, the
mostfertil partofalEnglandis(ofitsselfe)butbarren.”51
Sixteenth-and seventeenth-centuryaccountsof the northwestAtlantic’s
coastalseasby men suchasAnthony Parkhurst,Samuelde Champlain,and
CaptainjohnSmithdescribeda borealmarineecosystem thatseemedverydif-
ferentin certainwaysfromthe onein Europe,despitethesimilarity of species.
4O DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
After 1578barely a decade went by without some commentary detailing the
abundanceanddistributionofspeciesin thenorthwestAtlantic,the seasons in
which thosespeciesappearedin or departedfromcoastalwaters,the natureof
predator—prey relationships,the sizeof averageand extremeorganisms,the
system’soverall biologicalproductivity, and the behaviorof ■sh,seabirds,
marinemammals,andinvertebrates.There seemedto befewerperturbations
to thesystem,andmorebuffers.IfcoastalEuropeanborealseashadoncelooked
like thoseof?the coastofNorth America,thenthehumanimpacton long—lived
creatures in European waters, such as mammals, birds, and large ■sh, were
immediatelydiscernible.The explorers’accountsprovide not only a descrip-
tion of the environment that ■shermenand settlers encountered, but as thor-
oughan assessment aswill everexistof an almostunperturbedborealNorth
Atlantic marineecosystem.
Thesedescriptions,which havesometimesbeendismissedasextravagant
propaganda,arenumerous,andtheycorroborateoneanother,thoughwritten
by different authors, in different languages,with different agendas,over more
than a century.52
All speakto theextraordinarybountyof undisturbedseasin
thenorthwestAtlantic. CharlesLeighobservedin theGulf of St.Lawrencein
1597that “the seayeeldeth great abundanceof ■shof divers sorts.”53john Brere-
ton wrote from the Gulf of Mainein 1602of “■sh,namelyCods,which aswe
encline more unto the South, are more large and vendible for England and
France,than the Newland[Newfoundland]■sh.”During one of the ■rstre-
cordedvoyagesinto theGulfofMaine Breretonput his■ngeron what■shermen
for centuriesto comewould considerone of the region’sdistinguishinghall-
marks,thatcod gotlargerasonemovedsouthfromLabradorto Massachusetts.
He alsonoted“Whales and Sealesin greatabundances,”andpointedly ob-
servedthat“Oiles of themarerich commoditiesfor England,whereofwenow
makeSoape,besidesmanyotheruses.”In addition to cod andmarinemam-
mals, Brereton noticed “Salmons, Lobsters, Oisters having Pearle,and in■nit
other sortsof ■sh,which aremoreplentifull upon thoseNorthwestcoastsof
America,than in any parts of the knowenworld.” RecountingCaptainBar-
tholomew Gosnold’s voyage to the Gulf of Maine in 1602, Gabriel Archer re-
membered:“Nearethis Capewecameto anchorin ■fteenefadome,wherewe
took greatstoreofCod-■sh,forwhich we alteredthe name,andcalledit Cape
Cod. Hereweesawsculsof Herrings,Mackerelsandothersmall■shin great
abundance.”54 up thedelightsoftheMainecoast
CaptainjohnSmithsummed
with an implicit comparisonto homewaters,andpropheticwords:“He is a
very bad■sher,[who] cannotkill in onedaywith his hookeandline, one,two,
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 41
three hundred Cods: both the servant, the master,and the march-
. . . may not
ant, bewell contentwith this gaine?”55
.
Whenit cameto quantifyingstocksofprosaicspeciesregularlyencountered
in European coastal waters, including cod, mackerel, oysters, right whales,
seals,and seabirds,men such as Leigh, Brereton, and Smith implicitly fell back
on thebaselinesof abundancethat theyhaddevelopedduring yearsof voyag-
ing in Europeanborealwaters.Veteranseafarersknewwhat to expectof the
living ocean.MenforwhomVigilanceandobservationweresecondnaturepaid
closeattention to their surroundings, and wrote copiously about them, without
realizingthatAmericanabundancere■ectedEuropeandepletion.
During theseearly voyagesit was not just the sizeof individual ■shthat
struckEuropeansasnoteworthy,or the overallamountthat couldbe seenor
caughtin oneplace,but alsotheirquality.In 1605James Rosier,a gentlemanin
GeorgeWaymouth’screw,wrote thatwhile anchoredoff MonheganIslandon
the midcoastof Maine,the sailors“with a few booksgot abovethirtie great
GodsandHadocks,which gaveus a tasteof the greatplenty of ■shwhich we
found afterwardwheresoever we went upon the coast.. . . And towardnight
we drewwith a smallnet of twenty fathomsvery nigh theshore:we got about
thirty very goodand greatLobsters,many Rock■sh,somePlaise,andother
small■shescalledLumpes,veriepleasantto the taste:and we generallyob—
served, that all of the ■sh,ofwhat kind soeverwe tooke, were well fed, fat, and
sweetin taste.”Rosier,probably the bestnaturalist amongthe ■rstgenera-
tionsof Englishobservers,sensedthat the ecosystemwasnot producingone
speciesat the expenseof another,but thatinvertebrates,bait■sh,benthicfood
■sh,seabirds,andmarinemammalswereall flourishing.56
The repetition and insistenceof these accounts—some in English and
othersin French, someby clergy and othersby laity, someby experienced
seamen,othersby landsmen,somein thesixteenthcenturyandothersin the
seventeenth century—create a reinforcingpatternof veracity.Time aftertime
observerscomparedthe compromisedEuropeanboreal ecosystemthat they
knewwith the freshonein the westernAtlantic. “The sturgeonsandsalmon
ascendthe DauphinRiver at the saidPort Royalin suchquantitiesthat they
carried awaythe netswhich we had set for them,” wrote Marc Lescarbotof
springin NovaScotiain 1612.“Fish aboundtherein like mannereverywhere,
suchisthefertilityofthiscountry.”57
Fish boneanalysesfrom a variety of NativeAmericanmiddensspanning
the period from 5,000 yearsB.P.to 400 yearsB.P.revealthat that prehistoric
peopleroutinelycaughtcodofl to 1.5metersin lengthin inshorewaters.During
42 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
the seventeenthand eighteenthcenturies,and possiblyearlier,French■sh-
mongershadfour categoriesfor NewWorld cod,sortedby size.The ■rsttwo,
“gaffecod” and “of■cer’scod,” werefor ■sh1—2 metersin length. Sizeis an
indicationof agein ■shsuchascod.Native■shers,andthen newcomerssuch
as French■shermen,were routinely catchingcod three to ■vefeetlong in
inshorewaters—anindicationof a stockin a virtually pristine state.Over pre-
cedingcenturiesEuropeanshadalreadyskimmedthe creamfrom their home
waters.So the northwestAtlantic’sborealmarine ecosystemstruck the ■rst
fewgenerationsof Europeansto arrive asincomprehensiblein its abundance.
Of all the richesencounteredin Newfoundland, wrotejohn Masonin 1620,“the
mostadmirableis theSea,sodiversi■edwith severalsortsofFishesabounding
therein,theconsideration
whereofisreadieto swallowup anddrownmysenses
notbeingableto comprehend therichesthereof.”58
orexpress
Mason’sturn ofphrase,like thoseofotherearlywriters,needsto beregarded
in the contextin which he wrote it, and not necessarilyasan exaggeration.
Mostmenof hisgenerationandpreviousones,eveneducatedmen,hadlimited
computationalskills. Systematicprocedureshad not yet beenestablishedfor
estimatingverylargemagnitudes.In 1520or 1620,however,suchestimates were
hardlynecessary. Countingandmeasurement werelargelygearedtowardtrade
at thattime. Unlessa commoditywastransportedoversomedistancefor sale,
it wasunlikely to be measuredor countedwith precision.Standardizedmea—
surements existed for commodities such as foodstuffs and cloth, but units
varied for each.The volume ofa wine barrel, for instance, differed from that of
a barrelofolive oil or pickled■sh.Moreover,standardizedmeasurements,
par-
ticularlyforliquids,variedfromnationto nation.59
Aslateas1643thePlymouth
Colonydecidedto standardizeits “bushel” to conformto thatof theMassachu-
settsBayColonyfor ease0ftrade.Until then,thesetwo Englishoutposts,only
half a day’swalk apart,measuredin bushelsthat werenot the samesize.Mea-
surement and valuation, along with accurate counting and computation, were
specializedprofessionalskills uncommonamongevenliteratepeopleuntil well
century.60
intotheeighteenth
Without standardization,the head-spinningarray of measures,units, dis-
tances,andcontainersconfoundedsystematicquantitativecomparisonsin the
late Renaissanceand earlymodernperiods.However,a practicalarithmetic
developedaroundcomparativeempiricalunitsWithwhich everyonewasfamil-
iar, and for which no specialtools werenecessary.When distancewas measured
by pacing,distancesin feetcouldbe easilyreproducedwithin acceptablecer-
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 43
tainty.A very smallunit oflength, thebarleycorn,wasreadilyavailablein all
English farming villages.Eventhe innumeratecould measureconventional
thingsin units like feetandbarleycorns.For unusualcircumstances,includ-
ing thosesuchaswerefoundin theNewWorld, observerstypicallyrevertedto
a systemof analogy.This modeof representationwasasconventionalamong
earlymodernnaturalistsandmenoflettersasprecisemeasurements areamong
scientiststoday.Mason,aneducatedroyalof■cial,simplyadmittedthatno anal-
ogy at handconveyedthemagnitudeofNewfoundland’smarineresources.
Captainjohn Smithorjohn Masonwould not havethoughtto stretcha net
acrossa speci■cbayon a speci■cdayandinstruct their mento countor weigh
all the ■shlanded.Without a marketnearby,it is unlikely that scaleswould
havebeenavailable.Countingwould haveleft scoresof hashmarkson peeled
sticks.Contemporariesof SmithandMasondid not expectsuchspeci■cityor
considerit all that useful—otherwisepromoterssuch as Smith would have
weighedandcounted.When the baselineaccountsof the northwestAtlantic
ecosystemwere recorded,betweenthe middle of the sixteenthcentury and
themiddle of theseventeenth century,metaphorwasthenormativemeansof
conveyinglargemagnitudes.CharlesLeigh assessed seabird populationson
islandsin the Gulf of St. Lawrenceas“thicke asstoneslie in a pavedstreet.”
Metaphor,however,did not necessarilymeanhyperbole;thoughseventeenth-
century explorersdid not valueprecisequanti■cation,their observationsare
not without merit.
The presenceof somanymenwith ■rsthandexperiencein Americanwa-
ters acted as a check on hyperbole.Had the accountsof Americancoastal
ecosystems beenwildly exaggerated or inaccurate,plentyofexperiencedmar-
iners were on hand to set the record straight.BeforepermanentEuropean
settlementstook root atjamestown, Quebec, or Plymouth, thousandsofEuro-
pean■shingvesselsmadetheroundtrip voyageto Newfoundland,theGulf of
St. Lawrence, and the Gulf of Maine. The exact number will never be known,
becauseof scatteredand incompletedata,but the patternsare clear: tens of
thousandsof Europeanmarinershad ■rsthandexperiencein the northwest
Atlantic before1600.For most of the sixteenthcentury the Englishsecured
only a smallfractionofWhatRichardHakluytcalled“the manifoldgainewhich
theFrench,Britaynes,Baskes,andBiskainesdo yerelyreturn.” Basquescon-
centrated 0n whaling and, to a lesser extent, cod ■shingin the Straits of Belle
Isle,thenarrowsbetweenthenorthwesttip ofNewfoundlandandtheLabrador
shore.By the secondhalf of the sixteenthcentury asmanyas2,000 Basque
44 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
whalemenand■shermen congregated thereannuallyduringtheseason,though
noneintendedto colonizeor settlepermanentlyon that distant shore.Con-
crete evidencealso indicates a robust French New World ■shery.During 1559,
according to notarial records, at least 150ships for N ewfoundland were out■t-
ted in the three ports of Bordeaux, La Rochelle, and Rouen. In 1565 those
threeports dispatchedat least156ships.Actual numbersweremuchhigher:
recordsno longerexistfor manyimportant ■shingports. European■shermen
strayedfarfromhomebecauseEuropeanecosystems seemedunableto produce
enough ■shand whales to satisfy demand. In the summer of 1578alone, when
theEnglishwerestill minorplayersin thetransatlantic■shery,theEnglishman
Anthony Parkhurst tallied about 350 vesselsin Newfoundland and the Gulf of
St. Lawrence,including French, Spanish,Basque,Portuguese,andEnglish
shipswere
ones.Most were■shingfor cod,althoughtwentyto thirty Basque
whaling.WhenSilvesterWyetof BristolsailedtheGraceto theGulfof St.Law-
and twentie saylesof
rence and Newfoundland in 1594,he encountered “two
Englishmen”and “threescoreand odd sayles”of “■shermenof Saintjohn de
Luz and0f Sibiburoandof Biskay”—atotal of about85shipsinjust two har-
bors.Theseadmittedlyincomplete■gures,whetherdrawnfrom notarial rec—
ords or from ■rsthand observations, indicate that during the sixteenth cen—
the
tury, “far frombeinganareaon thefringeworkedby only a few■shermen,
northern part of the Americaswasone of the greatseafaringdestinationsin
the New World.” Everycrew sharedthe sameinspirationfor their dangerous
thatundepleted
voyage,andthe sameambition:to cramliving resourcesfrom
coastaloceaninto their cargoholds. Counting ■shspecies,muchlessindi-
vidual ■sh, was not a concern of a high order, but it is noteworthy that not a
singleaccountaccusingother explorers0f hyperbolewaseverpublishedby
with ■rsthandknowledge
anyof the tensof thousandsof European■shermen
of thenorthwestAtlantic marineecosystemin this era.61
Landsmen wrote some accounts of the western Atlantic’s abundance, but
in
manywere the work of seamenwith considerableexperience European
marinesystems.62Thesemenhadcomeof ageknowingthat“the ■shing forcod
upon the coastsof Lanchshirebegenitheat East[er]and
contynethtil myd-
sommer,”thathakewerefound“in thedeepsbetwixt Walesand Ireland,”and
tydeat Scarborough
thatthebest■shingforherring“beginith at Bartholomewe
and sopreadithealongthe coastuntil theycometo Thamesmouthconteynew-
ingevery gooduntil hollentyde.”GeorgeWaymouth,whomadea “most pros-
perousvoyage”to the midcoastof Mainein 1605,was from a
family that had
DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 45
■shedfor severalgenerationsin his homeparishof Cockington,aswell asin
Ireland and Newfoundland. Confronting a familiar suite of ■sh,seabirds,and
marinemammalsin thenorthwestAtlantic, menlike WaymouthframedNew
World abundancein light of the shopwornEuropeanmarine systemsthey
knew ■rsthand.“ Without knowing it, Hayes, Brereton, Leigh, Smith, and
other early observersin the northwestAtlantic were privy not only to 21vi-
sion of Americanwaters’abundanceprior to systematiccommercialexploi-
tation,but also to how Europeanestuariesandcoastalseasin the North At-
lanticborealregionmayhavelookedthousandsofyearsearlier,whenNeolithic
peoplemadethetransitionfromhunting andgatheringto settledagricultural
Villageson the coastof Europe.The explorers’voyageswerethusjourneysin
spaceandjourneysthroughtime—ecological time;their accountsre■ected not
just Americanabundance,but the depletionof Europeancoastalecosystems
that had occurredby the endof the medievalperiod. Nothing elseexplains
the astonishmentofjohn Cabot,_]acquesCartier, and other Renaissanceseafar-
erswho sailedinto the westernextremityof theNorth Atlantic borealregion.
The baselinestheyhadtakenfor grantedno longermadesense.64
The ■rstgenerationof Europeanobserversto documentAmerican waters
wrote from their assumptionsof normalcy.FatherPierreBiard,laterthehead
of the ■rstjesuit mission in Nova Scotia, had beenborn in 1567in southeastern
France.An educatedman andkeenobserver,beforehis departurefor Acadia
Biard spentyearsin Lyons, a city at the con■uenceof the Rhoneand Saéne
Rivers,andlived for at leastayearor two in Bordeaux,a city upstreamfrom
the Gironde estuary,the largestin France.He undoubtedlyknew that lam-
prey, salmon, sturgeon, seatrout, and shad could be found in the Rhone, and
probablywasawarethatsandsmeltliveddownstream,in theRhoneRiverdelta.
Fishmongersandchefsdealtin all thosespecies,with thepossibleexceptionof
sturgeon,alreadyseverelydepletedin manyFrenchrivers.YetBiard’saccount
of the springspawningruns in NovaScotia—notable for its explicit compari-
son of somespeciesin Francewith thoseof North America—wasnot that of
a man who had seenanythingsimilar before.“In the middle of March,” he
wrote, aftermovingto NovaScotiain 1611,“■shbegin to spawn,and to come
up from the seainto certain streams,often so abundantlythat everything
swarmswith them.Anyonewho hasnot seenit could scarcelybelieveit. You
cannotput your handinto thewater,withoutencounteringthem.Amongthese
 m_—

DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 47

46 DEPLETED EUROPEAN SEAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA

the English Channel,and the North Sea.Like everyecosystem,thosewere

■shthesmeltis the■rst;this smeltis two andthreetimesaslargeasthatin our
constantlybeingreshapedby naturalchanges.“Fluctuations,”ascontemporary
rivers;afterthe smeltcomesthe herring at the endof April. . . . At the same
ecologistspoint out, are“the veryessence
of ecosystems,”
andthepopulations
time come the sturgeon, and salmon, and the great searchthrough the Islets
ofmanyspeciessoughtbyhumans,includingmackerel,herring,andpilchards,
for eggs,asthewaterfowl,which aretherein greatnumbers,laytheir eggsthen,
■uctuatedramatically.The Devonpilchard catch,for example,waspoor in
andoftencovertheIsletswith theirnests.”65
1587,low again in 1593,and virtually nonexistent in 1594. Irish herring were
Biard’ssenseof wonderwasmatchedby thatof menwho sailedfrom other
Old World estuaries.Martin Pring departedon his voyageto New Englandin scarcein 1592.Faroe Islands cod ■sheriescollapsed in 1625and againin 1629.
Perceived“shortages”like these—inotherwords,theinability oftheecosystem
1603 from the mouth of the Avon River, which was the roadstead of Bristol
to producethevolumedesiredby harvesters—prompted ■shingmerchantsto
andlocatedwithin the Severnestuary.The Severnis oneofEngland’slargest
seekotherstocks.Coolingtemperatures mayhavecontributedto thegeographic
rivers, navigablefor much of its length and notoriousfor its extraordinary
expansionof the late medieval■shery.Scientistsnow know that seawater
tidesandtidal bore.Pring hadsailedfrom oneof thelargerborealestuariesin
below a certain temperatureinhibits cod’sability to reproduce.As formerly
Britain, yet he marveledat thebiologicalproductivity heencounteredin Mas—
reliable■shinggroundsoff Norwayfailed during the 14005,at the outsetof
sachusetts.Injune there were “Scales to make Oile withal, Mullets, Turbuts,
Mackerels, Herrings, Crabs, Lobsters, Creuises, and Muscles with ragged
English■shermen
theLittle IceAge,well—capitalized beganto sailwestinstead
of north, ■rst to Iceland, then to Newfoundland and Maine. Whether northern
Pearlesin them,” he wrote, awedby the “great abundanceof excellent■sh”
Europe’sonceabundantwaterswerebeingdepletedby “the longcontinuance
andbythe“greatstoreofotherRiverandSea-Fowles.”66
of ■shingand someabusein the taking,” asonesixteenth-centurydocument
Samuelde Champlain,who would becomethe bestAmerican naturalist
attested,or whetherthe ecosystemcould no longerproduceenoughto satisfy
andcartographerof his generation,grewup on the edgeof a marine ecosys-
specialized in heighteneddemand,perhapsbecauseof climatechangeassociatedwith the
tem where rivers, marshes,and seaconverged,and where locals
onset of the Little Ice Age, is not clear. It is clear, however,that European ■sh-
harvestingmarine resources.Champlainwasborn about1580in Brouage,a
smalltown on the Bayof Biscayjustnorth of the Gironde estuary.Notorious ermenwantedmore■shthantheycouldcatchin homewaters.68
Whalersand■shermen becameshocktroopspushingwest,inspiringchroni-
for its saltworks, and a magnet for ships from Scotland, Flanders, Germany,
clerssuchas RichardHakluyt to promoteoverseas expansion.As Europeans
andEngland,Brouagenestledin themarshesfringing theGulfof Saintonge,a
establishedoutpostsaround the Atlantic rim, ecologicalchangesfollowed.
bayfrontedby the Isle d’Oléronandthe Isle d’Aix. Its peoplewereseafarers,
CommoditiesharvestedfromAmericanecosystems routinelyweretransported
andboth Champlain’sfatherandunclewerecaptains.Bythe timehe departed
fromNewWorld centersofproductionto Old Worldsitesofconsumption.The
on his■rstoverseas voyage,probablyto theWestIndieswith hisuncle,Cham- of long—distance
bulk tradingin organicproducts,notably
rapidintensi■cation
plain knewthoselocalenvironswell.67And yet hehadnothing but awefor the
foodstuffs, timber, tobacco, and whale oil, constituted barely recognized eco—
abundanceand productivity of coastalecosystems in North America.Other
chroniclersof the westernNorth Atlantic’s borealregionhad similar stories, century,forinstance,asmanyas200,000
logicalrevolutions.Bytheseventeenth
metrictonsofcod peryear(liveweight)wereleavingNewfoundlandforEurope.
whetherLeigh or Rosier,departingfrom themighty ThamesRiver;Archer or
Aroundtheturn of thetwentiethcentury,whenRudyardKipling immortalized
Brereton, departing from Falmouthin the Fal estuary; or Edward Hayes,
the ■eetin his novelCaptainsCourageous,landingswerenot eventwice that
whosevoyagewestwith Sir HumphreyGilbert begannear Plymouthin the
amount.69
Tamar estuary.All of themknewwhat to expectof theborealNorth Atlantic
During the centurybeforetheAmericanRevolutionstriking improvements
in terms of sturgeon, salmon, seabirds, right whales, seals,■at■sh,cod, and
in shippingef■ciencyreducedthe costper ton/milerequiredto transportbulk
herring; yet all wereastonishedat theproductivity of the westernAtlantic.
goods.The story typically hasbeentold as one of accountspayable,com—
The European-dominatedAtlantic world originated, to no smalldegree,
in theBayof Biscay, moditiestransported,and fortunesmadeand lost. Silencedin that telling,
frominsatiabledemandsplacedupon marineecosystems
48 S'EAS AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
DEPLETED EUROPEAN

however,is an accountof biomassand energybeing transferredfrom one

ecosystemto another.Vastnumbersof Europeanconsumerswere then eat-
ing, as Richard Ho■'mannputs it, “beyond the boundsof naturallocal eco-
systems” and, asa result, refashioning distant environments. The oceanwas
not immune.Pressuredby commercialcapitalismandcornucopianfantasies,
the northwesternAtlantic’s coastaloceanrapidly becamean extensionof
Europe’sdiminished seas,a seachangecomprehensibleonly in transatlantic
perspective.70