Fishes: Zanclus Canescens

Sunday, 22 July 2012

Zanclus Canescens

Zanclus is the legendary first king of the Sicilian city of Messina. He is mentioned in an etiological passage by Diodorus of Sicily, and has become a symbol of Messina. In modern Italian, the form is given as Zanclo.Gegenus is recorded as the father of Zanclus. Diodorus writes of Zanclus as the supposed eponym of "Zancle" (the ancient name for Messina). The giant Orion is said to have helped Zanclus in building the city and the harbor.Zanclus has been identified with the male "Grifone" figure of Messina's traditional Mata e Grifone procession. The earliest records, by Francesco Maurolico, record only one the male figure, and associate it with Zanclus. When Zanclus is identified with the male figure in modern times, his female partner is identified as the Titaness Rhea.Stephanus of Byzantium also wrote about Zanclus, stating that Zancle could have been named either after him or the well.With distinctively compressed and disk-like bodies, moorish idols stand out in contrasting bands of black, white and yellow which make them attractive to aquarium keepers. The fish have relatively small fins, except for the dorsal fin whose 6 or 7 spines are dramatically elongated to form a trailing, sickle-shaped crest called the philomantis extension. Moorish idols have small terminal mouths at the end of long, tubular snouts; many long bristle-like teeth line the mouth