捕鲸的历史源远流长。据资料记载,早在12世纪,生活在伊比利亚半岛的巴斯克人就在比斯开湾猎捕露脊鲸。由于近海资源的减少和经济利益的驱动,捕鲸者开始向远洋扩张,16世纪时抵达北美海岸;17世纪时英国和荷兰的捕鲸船甚至在北冰洋水域作业。18世纪抹香鲸渔业活动兴起,成为世界范围内的一项新兴产业;美洲捕鲸者与其他国家的同行从大西洋一直捕猎到太平洋和印度洋。另外,日本人也自1675年开始捕鲸。这种大肆捕猎活动使鲸类自20世纪开始就已严重减少,而且捕鲸技术的发展加速了鲸资源的衰退。这种影响波及至人迹罕至拥有大量鲸类的南极海域。 Whaling history goes back to ancient times. According to statistics, as early as the 12th century, Basque people living in the Iberian Peninsula hunted right whales in the Bay of Biscay. Due to the reduction of offshore resources and the economic interest, whalers began to expand to the oceans and reached the coast of North America in the 16th century. In the 17th century, whalers in Britain and the Netherlands even worked in Arctic waters. Eighteenth-century sperm whale fisheries rise, becoming a worldwide new industry; American whalers and other countries peers from the Atlantic has been hunting to the Pacific and Indian Oceans. In addition, Japanese also whaling since 1675. This massive hunt has led to a severe decline in whales since the early 20th century, and the development of whaling technology hastened the whale’s decline. The impact has spread to the seething Antarctic waters, which have a large number of whales.