#sacred bees

[siamkram]

Brahmari Devi

[siamkram]

Saint Gobnait (6th century), also known as Gobnat or Mo Gobnat or Abigail or Deborah, is the name of a medieval, female Irish saint whose church was Móin Mór, later Bairnech, in the village of Ballyvourney in Ireland.

Celtic lore held bees in high esteem, believing the soul left the body as a bee or a butterfly. Gobnait is said to have added beekeeping to her life's work, developing a lifelong affinity with them. She started a religious order and dedicated her days to helping the sick. It has been speculated that she used honey as a healing aid. She is credited with saving the people at Ballyvourney from the plague.

Art by Joy McAllen, text from Wikipedia

[siamkram]

Austeja, Lithuanian Goddess of Bees

[siamkram]

“How does one get to be a bit of a bee? I've always remembered that phrase and have come to believe that the way to it is to recognize that in spite of one's knowing - all the stuff that has been picked up, or poured in along the way - one is always in some very deep sense in from of the Unknown; and I mean the Unknown as absolute and unknowable, that which unremittingly evokes the question without ever guaranteeing the answer. I think that it is only by taking this far from comfortable stance that one becomes able to receive the intimations that the Unknown is continually sending back to us, as a river at its sea-mouth sends back news of the sea to its source.”  -PL Travers, What The Bee Knows

[siamkram]

https://www.thoughtco.com/ancient-maya-beekeeping-169364

Stingless American Bees were Domesticated by the Maya

Ancient Mesoamerican societies such as the Maya and Aztec practiced beekeeping for at least two thousand years before the European honeybee

[siamkram]

“For bees, the flower is the fountain of life. For flowers, the bee is the messenger of love.” -Kahlil Gibran

[siamkram]

Last night, as I was sleeping,

I dreamt--marvellous error!--

that I had a beehive

here inside my heart.

And the golden bees

were making white combs

and sweet honey from my past mistakes.

-Antonio Machado

[siamkram]

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Celtic-Lore-of-the-Honey-Bee

Celtic Lore of the Honey Bee

The lore of the honey bee from across the Celtic lands, as originally published in Celtic Guide (Volume 4, Issue 7, July 2015).