Bees are the order of the day

[highlyeccentric]

It seems that Jennifer Lyn Jordan only has to put up a Weird Medieval Animal, and everyone's talking about it. Today, she introduces us to the bee.
Bees are the smallest of birds. They are born from the bodies of oxen, or from the decaying flesh of slaughtered calves; worms form in the flesh and then turn into bees. Bees live in community, choose the most noble among them as king, have wars, and make honey. Their laws are based on custom, but the king does not enforce the law; rather the lawbreakers punish themselves by stinging themselves to death. Bees are afraid of smoke and are excited by noise. Each has its own duty: guarding the food supply, watching for rain, collecting dew to make honey, and making wax from flowers.
Bees are pretty cool, in short. What's more, they're drunkards. Is it any wonder my Anglo-Saxons like them so much? A tightly-knit community serving a single Queen (Anglo-Saxons knew that the lead bee was female), every member with his defined role, and a love of grog to boot! Sounds exactly like life in Anglo-Saxon England to me.

Dr Nokes sums this up with the following:
No sugar cane, no chocolate, no vanilla ... heck, not even any tobacco! It seems that the only material pleasures left would be sex, wine, salted pork, and honey. Combine the three, and you've got Heorot Hall on a weekend.
(That was four, Dr Nokes.)

goblinpaladin has a post up about medievalism and the procrasinatory value of medievalist blogs. In his footnote, he offers a briefcomment on reading bestiary entries like this:
Not that accuracy is what people are looking for in the middle ages. Allegory, and reading the natural world to find out God's will, is what is important. The important difference in the shift from the Greek Physiologus through Isidore of Seville's Etymologiae and to the later Bestiaries is that the allegorical features become emphasised less and less. Even so, the focus is still on what we 'know' animals do, and less on going out and looking at them. So to comment on the 'modern accuracy' of a bestiary is to completely miss the point.
The Bee doesn't turn up in the AS physiologus at all (which isn't surprising, as it only has three entries). Nevertheless, I wonder what the allegory in the Bee is? Is it something about community or social structure? I think it ought to be.

Dr Nokes also put up a link to the Old English Bee Charm, translated by Karl Young. As I'm supposed to be writing an essay on charms at the moment, I figure it almost counts as work if I blog about this one.

Take earth with your right hand and throw it under your right foot, saying:

I've got it,     I've found it:
Lo, earth     masters all creatures,
it masters evil,     it masters deceit,
it masters humanity's     greedy tongue.

Throw light soil over them [the bees] as they swarm, saying:

Sit, wise women,     settle on earth:
never in fear     fly to the woods.
Please be mindful     of my welfare
as all men are     of food and land.

Young talks about the importance of earth in the charm: The practice of throwing sand or light soil over bees to get them to settle was common among early beekeepers throughout northern Europe. It has been suggested that this confuses their flight pattern, causing them to land. More important, in the magical spirit in which a performance of this sort took place, is that the scatter of soil over the bees defines their earth or home - they may leave gather pollen, but should always return to the precinct defined by the thrown earth.
In researching this essay, I've noticed that earth seems play an important role in a lot of the charms. There is the Land Ceremonies Charm, which is designed to improve the fertility of a field, and involves rituals performed over extracted sods and over the field as a whole. In that case, liturgical and biblical references are used to recall the field to its ordained purpose of productivity.
On the other hand, James B. Spamer's aricle "The Old English Bee Charm"¹ referred me to the metrical charm against Water Elf Disease, a non-peer reviewed translation of which I have located here, at The People's Front of Judea. Here, some form of injury or illness (possibly chicken pox? the translation here makes it look like a battle wound, though) is treated by the establishment of a sympathetic relationship with the earth. For those not familiar with the concept, magical sympathy is the principle behind voodoo dolls. A link is established between the subject of the ritual and the item used, and that similarity can be used to manipulate the subject. In the case of a voodoo doll, what its done to the poppet happens to the subject. I get the impression with Anglo-Saxon charms, however, that the link itself is the method of control. In this case, by the pronouncement of the charm, the wound is controlled and forced into a sympathetic relationship with the earth.
The same principle does not seem to be at work in the Bee Charm. Here, earth seems to be associated with ownership (although it's worth asking who is the owner and who the owned- the man or the earth?). This earth is earth in a specific sense, as in the Land Ceremonies Charm- a particular farmer's earth, a particular domain.

The other interesting thing about the Bee Charm is what it tells us about the uses of charms in the Anglo-Saxon period. It was once thought that this charm was intended to protect from a bee-swarm. Rather, it is a precaution against loss of a swarm- a swarming hive could easily leave the beekeeper's lands, settle elsewhere (possibly in another beekeeper's territory) and lose him his livelihood. Fines for bee-theft were notably high in Anglo-Saxon England, so we know that this was a real problem.²
The charm comes in two parts; according to Spamer, it used to be studied as two separate charms which had come to be connected over time. However, he (rightly, as far as I can tell) argues that the charm is a cohesive whole, consisting of a charm against bee-theft, and a second addressed to the bees, asking them to stay.
This charm is to be pronounced by the beekeeper himself, since it begins with  I've got it,     I've found it. It also shows the beekeeper involved in a serious struggle against another charm practitioner, probably another beekeeper. Our beekeeper declares that earth (possession)  masters humanity's     greedy tongue. This almost certainly refers to another man's charm. Note that the spoken word is understood to affect events powerfully. Our practitioner has to counter it with both words and rituals of possession.
What we have here is a charm for use, not by a specially trained or otherwise elect magic practitioner (unless beekeepers were such people- possible, but a bit of a long bow I feel), but by a common tradesman. What's more, the charm is areligious- there is no apparent appeal to deity at all, unless earth or bees are deities. It is a practical precaution against one of the realities of Anglo-Saxon life: another, stronger charm practitioner might easily steal your bees. Be warned.

1.James B. Spamer, "The Old English Bee Charm", The Journal of Indo-European Studies 2, 1979 pp 279-294.
2. Spamer, p. 282.

Comments

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

From what I recall, Bee wasn't in the original Physiologus, so there was no allegorical story. One may have developed in the interim, but my instinct is to say no. Remind me next week, when the semester is over, and I'll get back to you.

Lacey and Dansiger in The Year 1000, a deliciously fun pop-history book which actually has footnotes (gasp!) spend some time discussing bee charms (pp. 137-139). They reference David Hill, "A Handful of Grit: Anglo-Saxon Beekeeping," Beekeeper's Quarterly (1994: 28) in claiming the following explanation for the casting of earth over the bees:

...a modern beekeeper's explanation of the charm's effectiveness is that bees are genetically programmed to cluster around the queen and to take her down to earth in a protective bundle when they sense danger- be is a storm of hail or in a scattering of grit cast by a predatory Anglo-Saxon.

This is why it's used to prevent the theft of a swarm, but also to pin (wild, ostensibly, but probably also neighboring) swarms down and capture them for one's own use.

Figured you might find that interesting. The Year 1000 is pop-history, but it's lightly written and heavily referenced and therefore a good introduction for those of us like m'self who didn't have the benefit of a real university course in Anglo-Saxon culture before now.

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

IHmm... yeah. That's cool. I've read similar explanations before, but none of that tells you why the *Anglo-Saxons* thought it worked :).

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

I was just responding to Young's assertion that the charm "confuses their flight pattern, causing them to land."

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

*checks his notes*

Nope, Bee was lacking from the Greek Physiologus, so I imagine it crept into the Bestiary tradition in the twelfth or thirteenth century, along with creatures such as Wolf. It probably therefore lacks an allegory.

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

awww. that's sad.

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

Then write one! :D

[blackbuttoneyes.livejournal.com]

My bees are trained to sting on command, so thats how I keep the other beekeepers from charming them away.

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

awesome

Math Error? Me? Don't be absurd!

[(Anonymous)]

How dare you accuse me of a math error, little missy! HOW DARE YOU!!! Don't you know that I am incapable of error, and perfect in every way?!

If you had studied more diligently in your various medieval language classes, you would know that the number "four" wasn't invented until the early 1800s, by the notorious "Earl of Four." Until that time, every number beyond two was considered three. As the legend goes, the Earl of Four was very fond of playing cards and eating sandwiches. One day, while playing poker with his friends (ironically named the "Duke of Five" and "Marquis of Six," though no relation to the numbers), he was taken with a fit of recklessness, and discarded all the cards in his hands except for the ace. He then asked for "three cards, plus another one," to explain how many cards he wanted. The Duke and the Marquis roared with laughter, and thereafter dubbed "three plus one other" as a "four," in honor of the Earl.

Oh, no, it was not I who made the error, as you can plainly see. I would sue you for defamation, but I'm told by my lawyers that $3 would not be enough of a settlement to cover the court costs.

Yours,
Dr. Nokes

Re: Math Error? Me? Don't be absurd!

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

*quivers in fear before your awesomeness*

Look, everyone! Dr Nokes, he just maÞelode at me! surely this is against the Rules of the Internet?

*quietly and rebelliously counts under her breath* an, twa, Þrie, feower, fif, siex...

Re: Math Error? Me? Don't be absurd!

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

That was awesome.