Like bovine torpedoes, a trapped shoal of bluefin tuna, some two metres long, swirl in ever decreasing circles within the “chamber of death” as an intricate maze of nets closes around them.

The signal is given and the mattanza – slaughter – begins. Two dozen Italian fishermen on longboats haul the final section of nets to the surface. In a foaming frenzy of blood and water, the fish are gaffed and dumped into holds packed with ice, where they are dispatched with a dagger in the heart.