>
> For the curious, the early Christians took the
>fish as their symbol because "ichthus", the
>Greek word for "fish", lent itself to a
>convenient acronym:
>
> Iesous
> CHristos
> THeou
> Uios
> Soter
>
> ...which means "Jesus Christ, God's Son,
>Savior."

I also heard that the familiar fish symbol was used in ancient (Roman?) times as a kind of secret greeting between two Christians. One man, upon meeting another on the street, would strike up a conversation and surrepitously draw an arc in the dirt with his walking stick or foot. If the second man was not a Christian, he most likely would not even notice the gesture, it having been done non-chalantly. If he were a Christian, however, he would draw his own arc connecting to the other one and complete the fish symbol in the dirt. The first man would then kick the dirt up and obscure the symbol, thus protecting both of them. But thenceforth both men would know each other as Christians and know they could trust one another. Kind of like a secret handshake or something like that.

-- Dave