green-fish
(ˈgriːnfɪʃ)
[See green a. 9 b.]
† 1. Fresh, unsalted fish; spec. applied to cod before it has been salted or cured. (Cf. haberdine.) Obs.
| c 1460 J. Russell Bk. Nurture 851 Grene sawce is good with grene fisch. 1540 Old City Acc. Bk. in Archæol. Jrnl. XLIII, It. for a grene ffysshe a goyle of sawmond and for a haberdyne. 1580 Hollyband Treas. Fr. Tong., Moruë, or Mouluë, poisson, a fishe called Codde, or greene fishe. a 1625 Beaum. & Fl. Bonduca iv. i, [It] shews thee like a long Lent, thy brave body turn'd to a tail of green-fish without butter. 1623 Whitbourne Newfoundland 79 Two hundred thousand dry fish, ten thousand of large greene fish. 1630 J. Taylor (Water P.) Wks. i. 119/2 If..euery house in this Kingdome did spend but the quantity of two Haberdine or Greenfish in a week. 1655 Moufet & Bennet Health's Improv. 155 Whilst it [Codling] is new, it is called green⁓fish; when it is salted it is called Ling. 1682 J. Collins Salt & Fishery 90 Green-Fish (alias Staple Fish as they call it) cured with a good Salt, proves excellent. 1694 Motteux Rabelais iv. lx. (1737) 247 Green-fish, Sea-Batts, Cod-Sounds. 1736 Ainsworth Eng.-Lat. Dict., A green fish, asellus. 1867 Smyth Sailor's Word-bk., Green-fish, cod, hake, haddock, herrings, &c. unsalted. |
2. a. local. The coal-fish. b. U.S. (See quot. 1884–5).
| 1880–4 F. Day Fishes Gt. Brit. & Irel. I. 297 Gadus pollachius..Names.— Pollack: whiting-pollack..Sometimes termed greenling or green-fish. 1884–5 Riverside Nat. Hist. (1888) III. 183 The blue-fish (Pomatomus saltatrix)..in parts of Virginia and North Carolina it is known as green-fish. |