mackerel

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“
Off Dingle, it is remarked, "the supply of all kinds of fish is practically inexhaustible Immense shoals of herrings off Liscannor and Loop Head;" "the mackerel is always on this coast, and can be captured at any time of the year, weather permitting."

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Definitions (36)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. noun Any of several widely distributed marine fishes of the family Scombridae, especially the Atlantic mackerel (Scomber scombrus), an important food fish having dark wavy bars on the back and a silvery belly.
  2. noun Any of the smaller fishes of the suborder Scombroidea, such as the Spanish mackerel.
  3. noun Any of various similar fishes.

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Examples (50)

  • And then it grew time for the river-mackerel, and they used to bring in at sunset two or three hundred in a shining heap, together with great lobsters that looked as if they'd been carved out of heliotrope-stone, and so old that they were barnacled. —  The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 55, May, 1862
  • He was as dead as a mackerel, and so he could not say what it was; but the ould people was all sure that it was nothing at all but the ould Judge, God bless us! —  J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 1
  • A dozen men were drawing up the last net; but when they gathered round to see what they had taken--mackerel or jelly-fish--I cared no longer to look with them. —  Afoot in England
  • With mackerel, the most profitable catch, this is very important, as the mackerel so speedily deteriorates; but a good deal of the fishery that takes place off the Scillies is not in the hands of Scillonians--Cornishmen, East Anglians, foreigners, all compete. —  The Cornwall Coast
  • For mackerel which is a surface and midwater fish, they are much shorter, so that the headrope lies just below the top of the water Nets shot, the fishermen make fast the road for'ard; sup, smoke, sing, creep under the cutty, and sleep with one eye open Sometimes they are too wet to sleep; often in the winter it is too cold Afterwards, the laborious hauling in--one man at the headrope and the other at the foot. —  A Poor Man's House
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Etymologies (4)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English makerel, from Old French maquerel.

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  1. Formerly also mackrel, mackrell; = Dutch makreel = German makrele = Danish makrel = Swedish makrill = Welsh macrell = Italian macreil, from Old French makerel, maquerel, maquereau, macquereau, macareau, macreau, French maquereau, Old French also mach-erel, from Middle Latin macarellus, a mackerel, prob. for *maculellus, literally ‘spotted,’ so called from the dark spots with which it is marked, from Latin macula, a spot: see macula, macule, macle. Cf. Welsh brithyll, a trout, from brith, speckled. Cf. mackerel.
  2. from mackerel, n.
  3. from Middle English maquerel, from Old French maquerel, French maquereau, a pander; prob. from Middle Dutch maeckelaer, Dutch makelaar = German mäkler = Danish mægler = Swedish mäklare, a broker, agent, equivalent to D. maker = Old High German makhare, an agent, broker, = English maker (see maker). Commonly regarded, without good reason, as a particular use of maquerel, a mackerel (fish), there being in France a popular belief that the mackerel follows the female shad (called vierges or maids) and brings them to the males. On the other hand, some take the name of the fish to be due to mackerel in this sense: see mackerel.
 

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/ˈmækərɛl/
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