Modern definition: 1. a fish, esp. a herring, that has been cured by splitting, salting, drying, and smoking. 2. this method of curing fish. 3. a male salmon during or after the spawning season. —v.t. to cure (herring, salmon, etc.) by splitting, salting, drying and smoking. 4. if pronouced ki'pur, a young male Aborigine, usually 14 to 16 years old, who has recently undergone his tribal initiation rite

History: It will come as a surprise to many to find that the kippers we find on our plates today, are not in fact true kippers. The "Red Herring", the "Finnan Haddie", is actually a substitute, brought about by man's inability to farm the seas in a responsible manner. Once the seas of the North Atlantic teemed with shoals of happy kipper fish. These glorious red fish, half as large again as your modern day Herring, were once more common than Mackeral. They became the stock food of the Vikings who fished and ate them in vast numbers on their many bargain hunting trips across northern Europe, so much so that many Vikings (notably Eric the Red) took on the hue of the kippers they were eating; this being due to the high content of Alpha and Beta Carotene (C40H56) present in the Kipper. This is also why the vikings who ettled in Scotland, Iceland and Greenland, became more red of hair and ruddy of cheek, and accounted for their excellent health.

Unfortunately, it was just this excellent health provided to the vikings by their diet of Kippers, which led so rapidly to the Kipper's near extinction. The Vikings, Angles, and Saxons fished the Kipper in such large quantities that stocks were never able to recover, and the shiny red of the Kipper was gone from our seas forever. It was only then that the Scots developed the process of curing split herring in such a way that the flesh took on the hue and smoky flavour of the noble Kipper.

Did I say 'near' extinction? Oh yes, for deep under the ice floes of Greenland and the Artic Circle, there remain a few hardy shoals of Kipper, never emerging from their icy kingdom, they are safe from the marauding trawlers of today.

Famous Kipper eaters:

Ace "Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast." Rimmer, Prince Phillip, Winston Churchill, Eric the Red, Clive of India, King Canute, Jack the Kipper, President Nixon, the Scots.