Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)/Turbot

TURBOT, in ichthyology, Rhombus maximum, the most highly valuable of the Pleuronectidæ, or flat fishes, for the table. The turbot is a broad fish, scale-less, with numerous flattened, conical tubercles on the upper side; the lower eye is a little in front of the upper eye, and the lateral line makes a semicircular curve above the pectoral fin. In color it varies from gray to brown, often with spots of a darker hue. Turbot are migratory fish, traveling in companies where the bottom is sandy. They feed chiefly on small fish, crabs, and shell fish; but the bait used is always some fish of bright color and tenacious of life, for, though turbot are very voracious, they will never touch a bait that is not perfectly fresh. Weight from 5 to 50 pounds. In the English Channel turbot are taken by trawling. The turbot was known and prized by the Romans, and the fourth satire of Juvenal celebrates the fact that Domitian convoked the Senate to decide how a monster turbot that had been brought to him should be cooked.