Fishing rod is considered the most popular and the most common fishing gear in human history. Its principle is very simple and intuitive even for a person who took it for the first time. More than ten thousand different fishing rods are sold around the world every day. But how much do you know about the origin of these fishing gear? This question can often leave even experienced fishermen in a complete stupor. Meanwhile, the history of the fishing rod is much more complicated and interesting than it seems at first glance.

Until relatively recently, no one was particularly interested in the history of these fishing tackle. People are so used to this tool that no one even thought about where it came from. Most of the ideas were very banal and just consisted of "some savage" first inventing the fishing rod.

Such an assumption is quite reasonable, but, oddly enough, it does not find any historical confirmation. There are quite a few references to the process of catching fish in myths, ancient murals and rock art of ancient tribes (for example, among the Australian aborigines). But at the same time, they all mention spears, nets, traps, even bows. They just don't mention a tool that looks like a fishing rod. The researchers who investigated this question came to a rather interesting conclusion - neither south of the equator nor in the warm regions of Eurasia, no one had heard of fishing rods in ancient history.

Rod and fishing

Ancient legends and surviving images from human history testify to the whaling of Mesopotamian rulers, fishing spear and hippo hunting in the era of the Egyptian pharaohs, bait fishing practiced by Chinese emperors and philosophers. A fresco in one of Pompeii's houses shows Venus and Cupid holding fishing rods. Emperor Maximilian (1459-1519) and his knights also paid tribute to this hobby.

The first treatise on sport fishing is believed to have appeared in England in 1496, when the second St. Alban's Book edition, which included a section entitled "Guide to Line Fishing", which he wrote Juliana Barnes. This part was not in the first edition. But entertaining fishing is much older than it may appear at first glance.

So far the float fishing is one of the most common methods of sport fishing. With the advent of modern technologies and materials, the old dream of float anglers has come true - the rod has become light, thin, long, stiff and elegant. Along with thin and strong rods, you can catch a variety of large and cautious fish. The trend of modern equipment development was already in the 60-80s. In the 20th century, with the advent of polymeric materials, they opened up completely new revolutionary possibilities for anglers.

When was the fishing rod invented?

Ethnographic studies of the peoples of mainland Southeast Asia allow us to talk about the most diverse the use of fishing methods. Among them are archaic ones like archery or trap shooting. But for the peoples of this land fishing not with hook and bait the traditional ancient way.

Probably, the appearance of the fishing rod, or rather its prototype, is related to the tribes and peoples who lived in the northern regions of Eurasia. It is difficult to unequivocally determine why hooks with baits did not enter the everyday life of southern peoples in ancient times. It is possible that in northern and temperate latitudes this type of fishing was invented and spread due to the less abundant fish stocks in their reservoirs. At the same time, there is an assumption that hook accessories originate from a simpler technique - hooking (hooking), that is, hooking a fish behind the body. The latter method can only be used in reservoirs that are rich in fish or in massive concentrations of fish.

Ancient Greece practiced fishing with hooks that were made of thin metal wires or moths. The Greeks used copper or iron hooks, and the Romans started using bronze hooks. Archaeological finds that have survived to this day testify that the Greeks and the Romans had various shapes and sizes of fishing rods.

The modern fishing rod as we know it today originated in the 19th century. Several parts in the form of a copper ring have been put into use. Advances in technology and materials have continued to influence the evolution of fishing rods, and today there are many different types of fishing rods for different types of fishing.