Ek. Balon, ORIGIN AND DOMESTICATION OF THE WILD CARP, CYPRINUS-CARPIO - FROM ROMAN GOURMETS TO THE SWIMMING FLOWERS, Aquaculture, 129(1-4), 1995, pp. 3-48
Paleogeographical, morphological, ecological, physiological, linguisti
c, archeological and historical evidence is used to explain the origin
and history of the domestication of the wild carp. The wild ancestor
of the common carp originated in the Black, Caspian and Aral sea drain
ages and dispersed east into Siberia and China and west as far as the
Danube River, It is represented today by the uncertain east Asian subs
pecies Cyprinus carpio haematopterus and by the east European Cyprinus
carpio carpio. There is evidence that the Romans were the first to cu
lture carp collected from the Danube, and that the tradition of the ''
piscinae'' was continued in monasteries throughout the Middle Ages. Di
stribution of the carp west of the Danube's piedmont zone was clearly
caused by humans, as was the introduction throughout the continents. S
ome domestication in China may have been independent of similar activi
ties in Europe, but most of the modem-day activities with the common c
arp in far east Asia are restricted to the domesticated carp imported
from Europe, or at best to hybrids of local and imported strains. The
xanthic (red) common carp seem to have first appeared in early culture
s of Europe, China and Japan but reached their fame through recent art
ificial selection of multicolored aberrants in the Niigata Prefecture
of Japan. The production of the colored carp-the Japanese ''nishikigoi
''-presently exceeds in monetary value the production of carp as human
food. The nishikigoi as ''swimming flowers'' delight modern people as
much as the taste of carp delighted the Romans at the beginning of ca
rp domestication.