Pl. vivaria, also -iums. [L. vīvārium enclosure for live game, warren, fish-pond, etc., neut. sing. of vīvārius, f. vīvus alive, living.]
1. A place where living animals, esp. fish, are maintained or preserved for food; a fish-pond or fish-pool; = VIVARY 2. Also fig.
1600. Holland, Livy, 1389. Whereupon it commeth, that those places or parkes which are set out and appointed for feeding of Deere, we use to call Vivaria.
1653. Jer. Taylor, Serm. for Year, I. xxvi. 328. The face of the Sea is our Traffique, and the bowels of the Sea is our Vivarium, a place for fish to feed us.
1845. Gosse, Ocean, ii. (1849), 80. In some of the Hebrides, there are large pools for the preservation of sea-fishes, hollowed out of the solid rock…. Great numbers of cod-fishes are kept in these vivaria.
1888. D. Beveridge, Between Ochils & Forth, v. 80. The dry hollow … in former days served the monks as a vivarium, or fish-pool.
2. A place or enclosure, a piece of ground or stretch of water, specially adapted or prepared for the keeping of living animals under their normal conditions, either as objects of interest or for the purpose of scientific study; freq. in later use, an aquarium; = VIVARY 1.
1684. trans. Combes’ Versailles, &c. 87. In the Vivarium are seen many kinds of Animals which have been caused to be brought from Forein Countries.
a. 1700. Evelyn, Diary, 17 Nov. 1644. There is also adjoining to it a vivarium for estriges, peacocks, swanns, cranes, &c.
1853. Athenæum, 23 May. The new Fish house … has received the somewhat curious title of the ‘Marine Vivarium.’
1853. Guide Zool. Gard., Aquatic Vivarium.
1880. A. R. Wallace, Isl. Life, xiv. 297. Forming a kind of natural museum or vivarium in which ancient types … had been saved from … destruction.
1900. L. Huxley, Life Huxley, I. xii. 155. The bay was calm and suitable both for the dredge and for keeping up a vivarium.
b. A glass bowl, case, etc., in which fish or other aquatic animals are kept, esp. for purposes of scientific study; = VIVARY 1 b.
1855. Zoologist, XIII. 4849. Those who would view vivariums merely as interesting subjects for their drawing-room windows.
1856. Geo. Eliot, in Cross, Life (1885), I. 396. We set out for Ilfracombe with our hamper of glass jars, which we meant for our sea-side vivarium.
1890. Dk. Argyll, in Mem., xlv. (1906), II. 464. Your old vivarium is still standing in its old place.
