A researcher grasps the lid handle to a 3,000-year-old beehive, part of an extensive apiary in ancient Israel containing the oldest known remnants of beekeeping. -- Mazar, Tel Rehov Project
Posted on 08/31/2008 6:12:12 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
The Bible refers to ancient Israel as the "land flowing with milk and honey," so it's fitting that one of its towns milked honey for all it was worth. Scientists have unearthed the remains of a large-scale beekeeping operation at a nearly 3,000-year-old Israeli site, which dates to the time of biblical accounts of King David and King Solomon.
Excavations in northern Israel at a huge earthen mound called Tel Rehov revealed the Iron Age settlement. From 2005 to 2007, workers at Tel Rehov uncovered the oldest known remnants of human-made beehives, excavation director Amihai Mazar and colleagues report in the September Antiquity. No evidence of beekeeping has emerged at any other archaeological sites in the Middle East or surrounding regions...
The earliest known depiction of beekeeping appears on a carving from an Egyptian temple that dates to 4,500 years ago. It shows men collecting honeycombs from cylindrical containers, pouring honey into jars and possibly separating honey from beeswax. Beehives portrayed in ancient Egyptian art resemble those found at Tel Rehov, as well as hives used today by traditional Mediterranean and Middle Eastern groups, says entomologist Gene Kritsky of the College of Mount St. Joseph in Cincinnati.
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencenews.org ...
A researcher grasps the lid handle to a 3,000-year-old beehive, part of an extensive apiary in ancient Israel containing the oldest known remnants of beekeeping. -- Mazar, Tel Rehov Project
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Gods |
Don't let anyone Pooh-Pooh this discovery. |
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Honey is a pure food. It doesn’t deteriorate over time. Unless it is contaminated by something from outside, it doesn’t spoil.
3,000 years - that’s nothing. I’ve got woodware in some of my colonies older than that.
It’s bee puke! ;’)
The old joke (here in Michigan) — that there was a honey recall, because it was found to be contaminated with BPP.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
Shameless plug: Buy pure Israeli honey for Rosh Hashanah
LDS Ping!
What is BPP?
When they find something like a 3000-year-old beehive in the land of milk and honey, it's ... well ... mildly interesting, but ... YAWN ... it's just a beehive.
You are correct.
Here is your cocktail party fact of the week!
In fact HONEY is the ONLY food that does not spoil. It may change characteristics - like crystallizing - but apply some heat and it returns to its unspoiled condition.
Due to its unique composition and the complex processing of nectar by the bees which changes its chemical properties, honey is suitable for long term preservation and is easily assimilated even after long conservation. History knows examples of honey preservation for decades, and even centuries. "...small residues of edible honey have even been found in the pharaoh's tombs.
Thanks for the ‘Deseret’ ping! Cool stuff!
The chinese called this time the Valley of Obscurity and the Somber Residence; the Nordics called it the Twilight of the Gods. According to the Annals of Cuauhtitlan there was darkness in Mexico for twenty-five years. The American Indians say that it was not until the fifteenth year that plants would bloom. And for the Hebrew tribes, who had been led out of bondage by the pillar of smoke by day and of fire by night, this was the Shadow of Death.
How did mankind live when nothing grew? The tail of a comet is composed of carbon and hydrogen gases, and these elements were in suspension in the earth’s atmosphere after the comet departed. The Hindu Vedas, the egyptian papyri, and the Hebrew legends say that the wind smelled sweet, and eventually the carbohydrates combining in the air precipitated. mankind fed on morning dew, say the Icelandic traditions, and the Vedas tell of the honey-lash falling - as the Greeks say ambrosia all fell - from the clouds. Where the honey-frost fell on the waters, it turned them milky and sweet. Ovid, the Vedas, and the Egyptians say the rivers flowed with milk and honey. The precipitate also fell among the Israelites, they called it Manna.
:’) “bee Pee-Pee”... as opposed to Polybrominated Biphenyl, or PBB.
;’)
I like facts as nuch as I like bullets - and that’s a lot. Thanks!
No evidence of beekeeping has emerged at any other archaeological sites in the Middle East or surrounding regions...
and this:
The earliest known depiction of beekeeping appears on a carving from an Egyptian temple that dates to 4,500 years ago.
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