3,257
edits
Changes
→Use in Historical Periods
==Use in Historical Periods==
In the 3rd millennium BCE, both ancient Mesopotamia, in Sumer or modern southern Iraq, and Egypt show evidence of beekeeping having developed. Honey, at this point, was used as an offering for the worship of gods and for food consumption. Beeswax was also utilized for making lost wax products such as metals, candles, sealings, and even as dental filling. The importance of beeswax and honey, in fact, led to the development of beekeeping as an important profession already by the third millennium BCE. Beehives were kept in temples as well as by private beekeepers, who traded honey and beeswax. The Egyptians were known to make clay pots or hives, suggesting by the 3rd millennium BCE artificial hives were now made. The Hittite law codes mention fines given to those who would steel from beehives, indicating the importance that beehives had to the economy not only for food but also for wax.<ref>For more on early historical texts referencing honey and beekeeping, see Crane (2013) and: Kritsky, G. (2015). <i>The tears of Re: beekeeping in ancient Egypt.</i> New York, NY: Oxford University Press.</ref>
Egyptian sources also indicate the Levant as a land of honey. The Egyptian hero Sinuhe indicates that beehives were being kept in the Levant in the 3rd millennium BCE. This depiction of the Levant as a "land of honey" may have later influenced references to the region in the Bible as a "land of milk and honey." Both in the Egyptian and Biblical references to honey denote prosperity in referencing honey. In war campaigns in the region by the Egyptians, they mention taking honey as tribute, indicating the importance of honey as a food product but also, in Egypt, as something used in the embalming process. This is also true in other cultures that embalmed, such as in Georgia, which also used honey as part of the embalming process for the dead. In fact, honey jars have been found in Egyptian tombs.
