fishify

English

WOTD – 8 June 2017

Etymology

A display of herring being smoked at the Zuiderzee Museum in Enkhuizen, the Netherlands

fish +‎ -ify.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈfɪʃɪfʌɪ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈfɪʃɪfaɪ/

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• Hyphenation: fish‧i‧fy

Verb

fishify (third-person singular simple present fishifies, present participle fishifying, simple past and past participle fishified)

1. (transitive) To change (flesh) to fish; to transform into a fish.
   • 1591–1595, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies, London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, act II, scene iv, page 61:

     Ben[volio]. Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo. / Mer[cutio]. Without his Roe, like a dryed Hering. O fleſh, fleſh, how art thou fiſhified?

     One possible reading is that Mercutio is teasing Romeo for looking as pale and thin as a dried fish from which the roe has been removed, thinking that Romeo has spent the night engaged in sexual intercourse with Rosaline. Roe may refer to a roe deer or be a diminutive for Rosaline (Romeo is without his "dear" or without Rosaline), or to soft roe or milt (the sperm of a male fish, suggesting that the sexual activity has drained Romeo of his semen).

   • 1768, “A Sailor's Description of the Late Masquerade”, in The Annual Register, or A View of the History, Politicks, and Literature for the Year 1768, volume IX, London: Printed for J[ames] Dodsley, in Pall-Mall, →OCLC, page 241:

     By ſtrange kitchen alchymy, ev'ry diſh / Seem'd tranſmuted for Epicure Mammon: / There was fiſhified fleſh, and fleſhified fiſh; / A calfs-head ſeem'd a fine jole of ſalmon.

   • 1801, “The Old Hag in a Red Cloak, Inscribed to Matthew Lewis Esq. M.P. Author of the Grim White Woman, and of other Tales of Wonder! A Romance.”, in The School for Satire: Or, A Collection of Modern Satirical Poems Written during the Present Reign, London: Printed and sold by Jaques and Co. Lombard-Street, Fleet-Street, →OCLC, page 414:

     Ye ghosts and hobgoblins, and horrible shapes, / Ye lions, and wolves, and ye griffins and apes, / Ye strange jumbled figures from river or den, / Ye fire-born monsters, and fishified men, […]

   • 1841, Basil Hall, “Trip to Salerno—A Capsize—Amalfi—Sorrento—Mount St. Angelo”, in Patchwork. […] In Three Volumes, volume III, London: Edward Moxon, Dover Street, →OCLC, page 138:

     The cliffs are at most places perpendicular, or very nearly so; but every now and then there occurs a little valley, or a ledge of rock less abrupt than the rest, and there you may be sure of finding a small village, or at all events a house or two, and sometimes a tolerably respectable sized hamlet, looking down on its diminutive "marina," or fishing beach, with a cluster of fishified huts, and still more fishified inhabitants, clinging like cockles to the faces and edges of the rock.

   • 1844, William Henry Smyth, “CXXV. α Ceti.”, in A Cycle of Celestial Objects: For the Use of Naval, Military, and Private Astronomers, volume II (The Bedford Catalogue), London: John W[illiam] Parker, West Strand, →OCLC, page 76:

     The figure of this asterism [Cetus], a veritable monstrum marinum, with its long legs, ears, proboscis, missile tongue, and carnivorous jaws, ought rather to have retained the name Ὀρφὸς, Pistrix, as given by [Gaius Julius] Hyginus, than Κῆτος, Cetus, whose un-whale-like appendages did not escape the lash of [Samuel] Butler: […] Stanislaus Lubienietzki, in his Theatrum Cometicum, 1667, attempted to lop off some of these redundancies; but in fishifying the animal he has given him so capacious a mouth and throat, that a Munchausen's ship might well have sailed in. Indeed, the distinctions of a whale seem to have been overlooked by all the celestial delineators.

   • 2013 December, Susanna Hoffman, Victoria Wise, “Shimmering Fare from American Waters”, in Bold: A Cookbook of Big Flavors, New York, N.Y.: Workman Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 226:

     No fish in today's market, on restaurant menus, or on the cook's stove more personifies—or fishifies—a "You've come a long way, baby" story. There simply wasn't any fresh tuna to be had in American markets a generation or so ago. It was always canned and was presented only for eating mixed cold in tuna salad or hot in tuna casserole. Now it gleams fresh on ice in fish displays, ready to take home and sear as a centerpiece, singed and tossed in salads, thinly sliced or minced raw for sushi and tartars.

2. (transitive, figuratively) To make as wet as a fish; to drench with water.
   • 1822 December, “Vargas [Vargas: A Tale of Spain, in three volumes. London: Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy. 1822.]”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume XII, number LXXI, Edinburgh: William Blackwood, Edinburgh; and T[homas] Cadell, Strand, London, →OCLC, page 740:

     […] I have found a cure for his lunatic excellency. Water expelleth fire—marry, when he talks of being an archbishop, souse him, good Tio,—fishify him straight,—may be his madness is a dog madness which flieth from the fountain.

   • 1846 September, Richard J[ames] Lane, “The Water-Cure [Life at the Water-Cure; or, a Month at Malvern. A Diary. By Richard J. Lane. London: 1846]”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume LX, number CCCLXXI, Edinburgh: William Blackwood, Edinburgh; and T[homas] Cadell, Strand, London, →OCLC, page 385:

     For although unable to recognise in water an universal and infallible panacea for all the ills that flesh is heir to, we can yet bear a large testimony in its favour, and send it out to service with the highest character. It is our deliberate and mature conviction that the inhabitants of the Cumbraes and the adjacent islands of Great Britain and Ireland may, to their own infinite advantage, fishify their flesh a great deal more than they do at present.