Moby Dick; Or, The Whale

Historical Whale Authors and Sperm Whale Supremacy

The chapter catalogs the many who have written of whales, from the Authors of the Bible through Aristotle, Pliny, Aldrovandi, Sir Thomas Browne, Gesner, Ray, Linnæus, and numerous others up to the Rev. T. Cheever. The narrator notes that only those following Owen ever saw living whales, and but one was a real professional whaleman: Captain Scoresby. However, Scoresby knew nothing of the great sperm whale. The narrator argues that the Greenland whale has long usurped the throne of the seas, being neither the largest nor truly the monarch, yet owing to historical ignorance and prior claims, this usurpation has been complete. The narrator declares a new proclamation: the Greenland whale is deposed, and the great sperm whale now reigneth.

Existing Sperm Whale Literature

The narrator identifies only two books that attempt to portray the living sperm whale: those of Beale and Bennett, both surgeons to English South-Sea whale-ships and both exact and reliable men. While their original matter on the sperm whale is necessarily small, it is of excellent quality. Yet the narrator concludes that the sperm whale, whether scientific or poetic, lives not complete in any literature—it remains an unwritten life above all other hunted whales.

Proposed Cetology Systematization

The narrator proposes to create a popular comprehensive classification of whale species, promising nothing complete since any human thing supposed complete must be faulty. He will not provide minute anatomical descriptions but rather seeks to project the draught of a systematization. He acknowledges the ponderous nature of this task, comparing it to groping among the very foundations of the world. Despite the fearfulness of the endeavor and the tauntings in Job, he is in earnest and will try. There are preliminaries to settle first.

First Preliminary: Settlement of Whale as Fish

The narrator addresses the unsettled condition of cetology, noting that whether a whale is a fish remains a moot point. Though Linnæus separated whales from fish in 1776, sharks and other fish were still dividing possession of the seas with the Leviathan well into the 1850s. The narrator rejects Linnæus’s reasoning regarding warm bilocular hearts, lungs, movable eyelids, hollow ears, and other characteristics. He declares he takes the good old-fashioned ground that the whale is a fish, calling upon holy Jonah to back him. The key differences from other fish are lungs and warm blood, whereas all other fish are lungless and cold blooded.

Second Preliminary: Definition of a Whale

The narrator proposes a concise definition: a whale is a spouting fish with a horizontal tail. This definition results from expanded meditation. A walrus spouts like a whale but is not a fish because it is amphibious. The horizontal tail is more cogent, as most fish familiar to landsmen have vertical, up-and-down tails, while among spouting fish the tail invariably assumes a horizontal position. By this definition, all smaller spouting, horizontal-tailed fish are included. The narrator specifically excludes lamantids and dugongs (pig-fish and sow-fish), denying their credentials as whales since they do not spout.

Primary Whale Divisions by Magnitude

The narrator proposes his grand division of the entire whale host according to magnitude into three primary books, sub-divisible into chapters. These are: I. THE FOLIO WHALE; II. THE OCTAVO WHALE; III. THE DUODECIMO WHALE. The type of the Folio is the Sperm Whale; of the Octavo, the Grampus; of the Duodecimo, the Porpoise. The Folio division includes: the Sperm Whale, the Right Whale, the Fin-Back Whale, the Hump-backed Whale, the Razor Back Whale, and the Sulphur Bottom Whale.

BUCH I. (Folio), CHAPTER I. (Sperm Whale).—This whale, among the

BOOK I. (Folio), CHAPTER I. (Sperm Whale).—This whale, among the largest inhabitants of the globe, is also the most formidable to encounter and the most majestic in aspect. It holds exceptional commercial value as the only creature from which spermaceti is obtained. The chapter will address the curious philological origins of its name, which will be shown to be absurd upon closer examination.