Honey remained an important ingredient
in both the food and culture of classical Greece and Rome. The Greeks offered it in ceremonies to the dead and the gods, and priestesses of the goddesses Demeter, Artemis, and Rhea were called melissai: the Greek melissa, like the Hebrew deborah,
means “bee.” The prestige of honey was due in part to its mysterious origins and to a belief that it was a little bit of heaven fallen to earth. The Roman natural historian Pliny speculated in entertaining detail on honey’s nature.
Honey comes out of the air . . . At early dawn the leaves of trees are found bedewed with honey . . . Whether this is the perspiration of the sky or a sort of saliva of the stars, or the moisture of the air purging itself, nevertheless it brings with it the great pleasure of its heavenly nature.
It was more than 1,000 years before the true roles of flower and bee in the creation of honey were uncovered (p. 663). In fact, honey making is the natural model for all human sugar production. We too take sweet juices from plants and separate the sugars from the water. Palm trees in South Asia, maple and birch trees in northern forests, agave plants and maize stalks in the Americas: all these have provided the sweet