# General beekeeping > Native honeybees >  History of Beekeeping

## Greengage

I was looking up some history on beekeeping and came across this,
_"The Brehon Law tract on "Bee-judgments," of which the printed Irish text occupies twenty pages, enters into much detail concerning the rights of the various parties concerned, to swarms, hives, nests, and honey: of which a few examples are given here. If a man found a swarm in the faithche [faha], or green surrounding and belonging to a house: one-fourth of the produce to the end of a year was due to the finder, the remaining three -fourths to the owner of the house. If he found them in a tree growing in a faithche or green: one-half produce for a year to the finder: the rest to the owner. If they were found in land which was not a green: one-third to the finder and two-thirds to the owner of the land. If found in waste land not belonging to an individual, but the common property of the tribe, bees and honey belonged to the finder, except one-ninth to the chief of the tribe. As the bees owned by an individual gathered their honey from the surrounding district, the owners of the four adjacent farms were entitled to a certain small proportion of the honey: and after the third year each was entitled to a swarm. If bees belonging to one man swarmed on the land of another, the produce was divided in certain proportions between the two. It is mentioned in "Bee-judgments" that a sheet was sometimes spread out that a swarm might alight and rest on it: as is often done now. At the time of gathering the honey the bees were smothered."_
http://www.libraryireland.com/Social...III-XVII-7.php
Looks like bees were around for a long time here in Ireland, I wonder what type they were and how they got here.

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## Jon

> Looks like bees were around for a long time here in Ireland, I wonder what type they were and how they got here.


We had a talk at our association from paleo-botanist Valerie Hall a few years ago and she pointed out that sea levels were much lower and there was a land bridge from Europe. A large part of the North sea was low lying land a few thousand years ago - where the dogger bank is found today.
Assuming there was no bee trading in those days the bees could only have been Apis mellifera mellifera as that was/is the native bee of Northern Europe.
The uncertainty is over how many thousands of years bees have been present in Ireland as bees would have moved north as the ice sheets were retreating.
There was a recent paper posted on the forum which linked the management of bees with wax traces in cooking vessels and wax traces were not found in the far north of Europe.
The problem with insects is that they often leave no fossil or physical evidence of their presence.
They found Amm parts in an excavation of a Viking settlement at York.

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## Greengage

Interesting but we also have a group of wild-flowers native to Ireland but mainly absent from Britain form what is known as the Lusitanian Flora. 
This unique collection of Mediterranean plants came originally from the Iberian Peninsula (North Spain and Portugal), and in Ireland most are found in the South and West. Now it is assumed that they did not survive the last ice age so how did they get here if there was a land-bridge to the north it is possible there was one to the south as well.

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## The Drone Ranger

> The problem with insects is that they often leave no fossil or physical evidence of their presence.
> They found Amm parts in an excavation of a Viking settlement at York.


https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=...20York&f=false

Not sure if I have ever read that anywhere else though

The strange thing about our modern society is that if someone waltzed in and announced that they were worshiping Odin and expecting to enter Valhalla after death in battle we would rightly assume that they were either in the grip of a fever or mentally defective

On the other hand if some chap plants a mat on the floor sticks his bum in the air 5 times a day and announces that he is destined for Paradise and might speed the process up by blowing himself up we can't say he is a nut job without being accused of ignorance.

Not very PC but personally I'd rather see a bit more scoffing at the delusional rather than bombing  :Smile:

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## Jon

I think the York Viking stuff in in Honeybees of the British Isles - Beowulf Cooper.

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## The Drone Ranger

> I think the York Viking stuff in in Honeybees of the British Isles - Beowulf Cooper.


I suppose that must be the original source 
When you search through loads of Viking stuff online beekeeping doesn't appear to figure highly in the finds
Is it just a case of something that has become accepted by being constantly repeated? or do you think there is much evidence 

Lots of insects in amber it would seem so thats always a place to find traces  :Smile: 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6084974.stm

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## prakel

Some good references here:

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...isnSX5VFXgJ3Gw




> In the last few decades, however, excavations at sites including waterlogged levels, where organic material survives, have greatly increased our knowledge. The extensive excavations at Coppergate, York between 1976 and 1981 of an Anglo-Scandinavian (Viking) settlement (Kenward and Hall, 1995) revealed many traces of bees and bee products, suggesting, but not proving, that bees were kept in this urban situation. It has even been suggested that puff-ball fungi (Langermannia gigantea) found nearby could have been burnt to subdue bees using the smoke produced (Kenward and Hall, 1995), as recommended by the Rev. John Thorley some 800 years later (Brown, 1994). Wings of honey bees from levels dated to c. 935- 975 AD have been identified by morphometry to be A. m. mellifera (Ruttner et al, 1990).
> 
> *Are honey bees (Apis mellifera L.) native to the British Isles? by Norman L. Carreck*

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## gavin

Here is the evidence.  John Dews did the work, much later than B Cooper.  It is in The Dark European Honey Bee by Ruttner, Milner and Dews.

wings.jpg

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## The Drone Ranger

Hi Gavin I have a book by Dews and Milner but it got left outside in a sudden downpour one Summer and wrecked 
I haven't replaced it 
Prakel for some reason the link says downloading but nothing else seems to happen 
That might be due to Tapatalk or something on this tablet so I will try another laptop later


Sent from my LIFETAB_S1034X using Tapatalk

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## Jon

> Here is the evidence.  John Dews did the work, much later than B Cooper.  It is in The Dark European Honey Bee by Ruttner, Milner and Dews.
> 
> wings.jpg


I guessed wrong! I have that book and the other one as well.
Nice to note the correct use of morphometry to identify a pure race subspecies.

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## The Drone Ranger

Hi prakel the link was working and I have downloaded it 4 times without realising
Very interesting article thanks

Sent from my LIFETAB_S1034X using Tapatalk

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## Greengage

Still on the history topic, St Modonmoc is the Patron saint of Bees in Ireland there is a stained glass window to the saint in Farnaught church in Co Leitrim is was  put up by Rev. Joseph Garvan Digges who is considered to be the Father of Irish Beekeeping . Rev. Digges was private Chaplain to the Clements Family – Earls of Leitrim at their Lough Rynn Estate, Mohill and served at Farnaught and Mohill Churches. His book, first published in 1904, “The Irish Bee Guide” is regarded as the standard book of beekeeping in Ireland and the best of the general guides to beekeeping published in the British Isles.( I have a link to a PDF doc of the book if anyone interested) Here is a photo of the stained glass window.I have a link to a bit more about him if you are interested.
http://www.gloine.ie/gloine/images/i...83010-p015.jpg
http://www.gloine.ie/gloine/images/i...83010-p017.jpg That's him surrounded by the bees that followed him from Wales.

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## prakel

> His book, first published in 1904, The Irish Bee Guide is regarded as the standard book of beekeeping in Ireland and the best of the general guides to beekeeping published in the British Isles.


Manley, who himself revised Digges' book  in the 1940s offers some gossipy background information:




> Another personality in beekeeping and the author of another guide to the beekeeping hobby was JRG Digges who started The Irish Bee Journal in, I believe, 1901, and followed this up by writing and publishing The Irish Bee Guide in 1904. This was a somewhat larger book than the Cowan guide and was written in a more poetical style. Unfortunately it led to trouble....
> 
> .....on publication of the Irish book Cowan claimed that Digges had infringed his copyright. A number of blocks that Digges borrowed from various appliance dealers and others were claimed as his property by Cowan, and Digges was faced with the alternative of signing a stringent apology or loosing his book; so he swallowed his pride and the apology was framed and triumphantly displayed on the walls of the headquarters of the British Beekeeper's Association for many years.....
> 
> *Honey Farming by R.O.B Manley*

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