Balık ve Balıkçılık (Book)

We are introducing a book that was written in 1915 but still can be considered as a bedside book even after more than a century. We can call this book an epic story on fishing. This is first study on Fish and Fishery. Yes, we are talking about Karekin Deveciyan's book Balık ve Balıkçılık (“Fish and Fishery” in English) published in Ottoman Turkish alphabet in 1915.

The book Balık ve Balıkçılık by Karekin Deveciyan, who worked as a manager in Istanbul Fish Market and as fisheries chief inspectorate between the years 1910-1917, is the most essential book written about fishery in Turkey.

It is also one of the most precious books in our library. The visual on the cover of the book is amazing. Who knows how many of the fish on that cover still inhabit our seas? The diagrams and maps in the book that describe the fisheries, and the spots and methods for catching different types of fish are wonderful and the book in general is a great pioneer in the relevant period.

It is one of the most important works. In addition to gaining appreciation from the enthusiasts of the topic, the book has been a reference for almost every book about fish and fisheries in the recent years, which witnessed a rapidly increasing number of such publications.

Historian Reşat Ekrem Koçu explains the significance of this unparalleled book in the fourth volume of his famous book İstanbul Ansiklopedisi (“Encyclopedia of Istanbul”): “Balık ve Balıkçılık” is one of the remarkable rare books in our national library and also the only work on the subject.