38
INTRODUCTION
professionals by composing a tract for their instruction must
himself have been a professional. The only weighty argument in
favour of concluding that Irish lawtracts were written by clerics is
that, elsewhere in early medieval Europe, they had a near monopoly
of writing. But to that argument one may reply that nowhere else in
Europe were the professional lion-ecclesiastical men of learning so
evident and so organized as in Ireland.
BB , then, is a lawtract of unusual interest. It is datable, like CG,
by a mixture of historical and linguistic evidence. It is the leading
product of a school as well as of an individual. It betrays, as few
other lawtracts do, the modes of thought of its author. Finally, it
casts much light on the law of neighbourhood, as well as some light
on such topics as theft and tree-law.
BEE-KEEPING IN EARLY IRELAND
Origins of bee-keeping. Bees are members of the order
Hymenoptera, which also includes wasps, ants, ichneumon flies and
sawflies. Many kinds of social bees store honey in their nests in such
a way that it can be taken by man. Generally, the amount of honey
stored is very small; for example, various species of the genus Bombus
(bumblebee) — including some which are native to Britain and
Ireland — store a few ounces of honey in oval cells known as
‘ honey-pots k1 2 Almost all the honey eaten by man comes from two
closely related species of the genus Apis (honeybee), i.e. Apis
mellifera (the Western honeybee) and Apis cerana 2 (the Eastern
honeybee). Dr. Colin Butler ( The World of the Honeybee , London,
1954, chapter 2) suggests that these two species derive from a
common ancestral type which lived in tropical Asia. The Eastern
honeybee has continued to inhabit this region where it has probably
diverged little from the ancestral type. The Western honeybee has
spread of its own accord into the Middle East and much of Europe
and Africa. Man has been responsible for its further spread during
the last few centuries to America, Australia, etc.
Over the millennia, different races of the Western honeybee
gradually evolved to suit local conditions. Dr. Butler (op. cit. pp.
1 Taking honey from bumblebee nests (Mod. Ir. cuasnog, pniais(n)eog ,
talmhog ) used to be a common pastime of children, particularly at hay-making
time.
2 Formerly Apis indica.
INTRODUCTION
39
19-20) distinguishes five principal races. The North-West European
race is Apis rnellifera mellifera var. lehzeni , which is a hardy darkbrown honeybee with a short tongue. This race inhabits Northern
Germany and Scandinavia. Before the First World War it was
common throughout the British Isles, where it was known as the
‘ British Brown bee ’ (or alternatively, the 4 British Black bee ’). A
series of epidemics known as ‘ Isle of Wight disease ’ destroyed about
90% of the British Brown bee between 1909 and 1917. Italian,
Caucasian, Cyprian and other varieties were subsequently imported
so the honeybee of Britain and Ireland is now of very mixed ancestry.
It is not known when or where man first started keeping bees.
The earliest evidence of bee-keeping comes from a relief in the
Temple of the Sun at Abusir, Egypt (built about 2400 B.C.) which
depicts bee-hives. References to bee-keeping occur in the Hittite
laws of about 1300 B.C. and are frequent in early Greek and Roman
sources. For further information on early bee-keeping, see Klek and
Armbruster’s Die Bienenkunde des Altertums i-ii in Archiv fur
Bienenkunde (1919-20), Dr. H. M. Fraser’s Bee-keeping in Antiquity
(1951), and pp. 453-65 of Honey , a comprehensive survey , edited by
Dr. Eva Crane (1976).
The early history of the honeybee in the British Isles is obscure,
and expert opinion is divided as to whether the honeybee was
introduced by man or made its own way to Britain and Ireland when
there was still a land-connection with the Continent. In his Field
Guide to the Insects of Britain and Northern Europe (1973) p. 286
Dr. Michael Chinery is of the opinion that ‘ the honeybee is not
really a native of Britain ’. On the other hand, Dr. Eva Crane thinks
that the honeybee is likely to be native to both Britain and Ireland.1
1 We are very grateful to Dr. Eva Crane of the International Bee Research
Association and Dr. John Breen of the Biology Department of Thomond
College of Education, Limerick, who have both read earlier drafts of this
introduction and made many suggestions and corrections. With regard to the
problem of how long the honeybee has been present in Britain and Ireland, Dr.
Breen has kindly drawn our attention to the work of Professor E. J. DuPraw of
the University of California, who has published a number of articles on the
honeybee in non-Linnean Taxonomy (e.g. Nature vol. 202 (1964) pp. 849-52).
By studying patterns of wing-venation, Prof. DuPraw has been able to show the
extent to which the honeybee populations of various areas diverge from one
another. His approach might be able to demonstrate whether the British Brown
variety of honeybee has been in Britain and Ireland for thousands of years or is
a 5th-6th century introduction from the Continent. On account of the largescale importation of other varieties after the near-extinction of the British Brown
bee from ‘ Isle of Wight disease ’ it would be necessary to work with preserved
specimens collected in Britain or Ireland before about 1917.
40
INTRODUCTION
The belief that the honeybee was introduced to Ireland by man
is found in Early Irish tradition. According to the 8th century
Felire Oengusso (Feb. 13) a swarm of honeybees was brought from
Britain by the saint Mo Domnoc, who flourished in the early 7th
century A.D. This tradition was known to Giraldus Cambrensis
( Topographia Hiberniae i c. vi) in the 12th century. However, early
saints were credited with the introduction of a number of agricultural
and other techniques, some of which are known from archaeological
evidence to be of far greater antiquity.1 The truth may be that the
monasteries practised bee-keeping on a larger scale than was known
in pre-Christian Ireland, and so acquired the reputation for having
introduced it. As well as honey, each monastery would have needed
considerable quantities of beeswax for candle-making and other
purposes.
The nature of Irish bee-law might also be taken as evidence that
the honeybee was introduced as late as the 5th or 6th century. Some
of the more peculiar aspects of Irish bee-law (such as the principle
of ‘ grazing-trespass ’ by bees) could be explained as the reaction of
lawyers who were trying to cope with an unfamiliar situation. Their
problem may have been (as Dr. Binchy suggests in Erin xvii 56) to
graft the important innovation [of bee-keeping] on to their traditional
law of neighbourhood. (One can compare the legal anomalies which
arose in the 20th century owing to the fact that regulations concerning
aeroplanes were based on nautical analogies). Thus in §§52-3 the
stealing of bees from a faithche or ‘ green ’ incurs the same penalty
as the theft of large animals, whereas if the bees are outside the
faithche only the penalty for the theft of small animals is due. This
looks as if bees were fitted into an already existing system of penalties
for theft of livestock.
On the other hand, the linguistic evidence suggests that Irish
acquaintance with the honeybee is a lot older than the 5th or 6th
century. The Irish language has native words for ‘ bee ’, ‘ honey ’
and ‘ mead \ The principal word for ‘ bee ’ in Irish is bech (IEW
116, Eriu xxii 184-7) which appears with a prosthetic s- in Scottish
Gaelic speach.2 It is cognate with Old English beo , Old Church
1 For example, the saint Finan Camm is accredited with the introduction of
wheat to Ireland ( Fel . Oen. notes p. 112). In fact, wheat has been cultivated here
since neolithic times (A. T. Lucas, Gwerin iii 9).
2 The British branch of the Celtic languages uses a different word (probably
meaning originally ‘ the stinging one ’ cf. Welsh gwanu ‘ to pierce ’)• Welsh and
Cornish gwenynen, Breton gwenanen.
INTRODUCTION
41
Slavonic bicela , Lithuanian bite , etc. The Irish word for 4 honey ’
is mil, which is cognate with Welsh, Cornish and Breton mel , Greek
meli, Latin mel , etc. ( IEW 723). ‘ Mead ’ in Irish is mid ( miodh ),
which is cognate with Welsh medd, Corn, meth, Bret, mez, Sanskrit
madhu -, Greek methu, etc. (7£JT 707).
It might be argued that these Irish words were applied originally
to the native species of bumblebee, whose honey-stores have no
doubt been raided ever since the arrival of man. However, bumblebees store honey in such small quantities that it seems unlikely that
their honey was ever of economic importance, or obtainable in
sufficient quantity to make mead.
Two other Irish bee-terms, tarbsaithe and betham, add weight to
argument that the honeybee was present in Ireland long before the
5th or 6th centuries. The term tarbsaithe lit. ‘ bull swarm ’ is used
in Old Irish of the 2nd swarm which emerges annually from a colony
of bees. It does not occur in the 7th century text of Bechbretha ,
but is used in a 9th century gloss to §20. The same term occurs in
Medieval Welsh ( taruheit ) and in Breton ( tarvhet ) and probably
goes back to a Common Celtic * tarwo-satios (see note to §25 a s. v.
tarbsaithe). As no species of bumblebee sends out swarms (Butler
op. cit. pp. 31, 152-66) this suggests that honeybees were kept by the
speakers of Common Celtic, or at least that they tended wild
honeybees nesting in tree-cavities in forests. It also suggests that
the Celtic-speaking people who came to Ireland (whose language
later developed into Old Irish) brought with them some knowledge
of bee-keeping.
The same conclusion is indicated by the agreement of Med. Welsh
bydaf 4 colony of bees ’ with Middle Irish *betham , nom. pi.
bethamain (RC xxvi 34, xxvii 85, KZ xl 245) probably going back to
Common Celtic * betamon -. This may be from Indo-European *bhei
4 bee ’ with -t- enlargement ( IEW 116) combined with the suffix of
agency - amon - ( Grammar §268). If so, the colony of bees was viewed
as the 4 maker of (swarms of) bees.’ Again, this suits only the
honeybee.
Furthermore, the entire text of BB contains only four Latin
loanwords: arm 4 weapon ’ (§39), elocc 4 bell ’ (§46), eclais k church ’
gen. sg. ecailse (§49) and membur 4 member ’ (§49). If bee-keeping
had come with Christianity in the 5th or 6th century one might
expect associated Latin terminology.
42
INTRODUCTION
To sum up: the linguistic evidence — though uncertain — indicates
that the honeybee was present in Ireland before (probably long
before) the arrival of Christianity
Economic Importance. The existence of a special law-tract on
honeybees demonstrates their considerable importance in the early
Irish economy. In a short Old Irish text on judges ( CIH 573.25)
bees are included among the eight types of livestock ( cethrae ), along
with cows, pigs, horses, sheep, goats, hens and geese. Bee-plagues
in 950 and 992 A.D. were considered of sufficient importance to be
recorded in the Annals of Ulster. The 8th century Cain Domnaig
‘ Law of Sunday ’ includes tracking bee swarms ( dul i ndiaid bech)
as one of the kinds of work which the Church permits on Sundays
{Erin xx 162). The main law-tract on distraint refers to the robbing
of bee-hives (im turorgain do bechdln, CIH 384.20). There are also
many references to honeybees in sagas, poetry and saints’ lives.
The main use of bees was of course honey-production. Honey
was the only sweetener available, as cane-sugar was not imported
into Western Europe until about the 12th century (except perhaps in
very small quantities) and remained for many centuries a luxury of
the rich. The 8th century Bretha Crolige mentions honey as a
tarsann or ‘ relish ’ ( Eriu xii 36 §45) and Fled Bricrenn from
approximately the same period speaks of 4 wheaten bread baked with
honey ’ ( LU 8125). In addition to providing flavour, honey must
have been a useful foodstuff in its own right, as it is a source of
energy-giving carbohydrates (it also contains proteins, minerals and
vitamins, though not in sufficient quantity to be of much nutritional
value). Being a supersaturated sugar syrup, honey keeps well, and
so must have been particularly appreciated during the winter. Its
medical properties were highly rated in early Ireland, as elsewhere
(see note to §6 inlan ngalair).
The other product of the honeybee is beeswax. It was of
particular importance to the monasteries, as it was used to make the
candles necessary for Christian worship.1 The O. Ir. word for beeswax is ceir, a borrowing from Latin cera : it is the only Latin loan
among the O. Ir. words connected with beekeeping.2 Surprisingly,
neither our text nor its glosses and commentary refer to beeswax.
1 For various other uses of beeswax in a 13th century English monastery
(Beaulieu), see Frank Vernon Bee World 60 (4) pp. 170-75 (1979).
2 The O. Ir. word for ‘ candle ’ ( caindel ) is also a Latin loan (from candela).INTRODUCTION
43
In Welsh law, on the other hand, beeswax (cwyr) is frequently
mentioned, e.g. Llyfr Blegywryd ‘ whoever finds a bee’s nest, if he
shows it to the owner of the land, he is to have four pence and his
dinner, or the wax ’ (ed. Williams and Powell p. 55).
It should be stressed that the lengthy treatment of bees in Early
Irish law does not entitle us to conclude that they were of greater
economic importance in Ireland than elsewhere in Western Europe.
The length of the Irish tract is partly due to digressions on tree-law
(§§12-17) and absconders (§39), partly to the complicated treatment
of the ownership of swarms (§§36-49), and partly to the Irish
lawyers’ view that bees could be guilty of ‘ grazing-trespass ’ like
a cow or other domestic animal. One can contrast Welsh law, where
the subject of swarms is disposed of briefly (see texts in Appendix 7).
Furthermore, Welsh law makes no mention of 4 grazing-trespass ’
by bees; indeed — so far as we have been able to find out — no other
legal system (past or present) has attempted to regulate this form of
trespass. In Irish law it is not peculiar to Bechbretha, however; an
8th or 9th century tract on distraint ( Celtica x 80 §11) describes how
trespassing bees may be identified — see Appendix 6.
Honey extraction. If the weather is warm and sunny when
nectar-yielding flowers are in bloom, a colony of honeybees collects
large quantities of nectar, generally within a radius of about a mile
from the hive. This nectar is converted into honey in the hive and
is stored in waxen cells as a food-supply for later use. The bee-keeper
must know how much honey can be taken from a colony without
causing it to starve the following winter. In an average year a modern
Irish hive is expected to yield 30-40 lbs. of honey.
The taking of honey from bees (whether in a hive or up a tree)
has always been a somewhat hazardous undertaking, even when
carried out by expert bee-keepers. In both ancient Roman and
contemporary bee-keeping, the bees are rendered more docile by
the administration of smoke. Our text tells us nothing about the
Early Irish methods of taking the honey. It is clear, however, that
the bees were not destroyed at the extraction of the honey from the
hive (as in the sulphur-pit method widely practised before the
invention of the movable frame hive in the 19th century; see note to
§27 collud). We know from §6 of Bechbretha that honey was
sometimes taken from a hive in its first three years. The same stock
of bees was expected still to occupy the hive in its fourth and fifth
years (§§19-22).
44
INTRODUCTION
Hives. There is no information in our text about the type of
bee-hive used by early Irish bee-keepers. The usual Old Irish word
is lestar which is a borrowing from British (> Welsh llestr, Cornish
lester, Breton lestr) and must have entered the Irish language around
the 5th-6th centuries A.D. (If it were an earlier borrowing the
expected form would be *lessar , cf. Latin castellum > Caissel). In
the British languages and in Irish the word means 4 vessel ’, both in
the sense of 4 container for liquids, vase ’ and 4 boat, ship.’ In
Welsh and Irish the further meaning 4 bee-hive ’ is attested (in Welsh
always in a compound with gxvenyn 4 bee ’ : gwenynllestr). The use
of the same term for bee-hive in both Irish and Welsh provides
some slight evidence of British influence on early Irish beekeeping.
Another O. Ir. word probably meaning 4 bee-hive ’ is beck-din (lit.
‘bee-shelter’) which is attested only once ( AL i 166.27 = CIH
384.20). Dr. Crane suggests that it could refer rather to a shelter for
bee-hives.
The collective lestrae 4 a group of hives, an apiary ’ occurs in
§30 of our text. In the B glosses (dating from approximately the
9th century) the word for 4 hive ’ is always lestar , but in the A glosses
and commentary (ranging in date from about the 12th to the 16th
centuries) ce{i)s is also frequently used (see Index). In 30b the first
A glossator uses ce{i)s to explain lestar. This suggests that lestar had
gone out of use in the meaning 4 bee-hive ’ some time before the 14th
century (when the first A glosses were written down — see Introduction p. 4). Possibly this change in terminology reflects a change
in bee-keeping practice. The basic meaning of ce{i)s is 4 basket,
hamper,’ so one could guess that a straw or wickerwork type of hive
replaced the presumably wooden lestar around the 10th or 11th
century. The word cllab, of similar meaning to ce(i)s, is also used
for 4 bee-hive ’ in legal glosses (e.g. AL i 170.19 = CIH 384.35), in
the 11th century Lebor na Cert (ed. Dillon p. 128 1. 1900), and in
the 11th century Fragmentary Annals of Ireland (ed. Radner p.
172).
From about the 17th century onwards the regular word for
4 bee-hive ’ is coirceog {cor cog). A 19th century triad in O’Rahilly’s
Miscellany of Irish Proverbs (p. 68) reads 777 beaga is fearr: beag na
curcoige , beag na caereach, agus beag na mna 4 three small things
which are best: a small bee-hive, a small sheep, and a small woman.’
DIL (s.v. corcog) suggests that this word may be a derivative of corca
(coirce) 4 oats.’ Coirceog may thus have referred originally to a stookINTRODUCTION
45
of oats (see Dinneen’s Irish-English Dictionary) and later developed
the meaning 1 a bee-hive made out of oat-straw, a bee-hive (of any
type).’
Our text (§§50-3) makes it clear that bees might be kept in a
garden (i llugburt ), in a courtyard (i llius), in a field near the dwellinghouse (/ faithchi ) or well away from the house ( sechtar faithchi).
The third A glossator (53a) remarks that in the latter case ‘ the bees
were doubtless put out for a good reason.’ Perhaps the text refers
to the bringing of bee-hives to a particularly rich source of nectar.
In modern beekeeping, hives are often transported to moorland in
late summer so that the bees can make heather honey. Pliny (Natural
History , book 21, chapter 43) refers to the transport of hives by boat
and mule in Italy and Spain.
Legal commentary shows that bees kept in a courtyard were at
risk from poultry. The three crimes of hens within a courtyard are
listed as maethslucud bech -j lot roidh *] cainninne ‘ soft(?) swallowing
of bees and destruction of madder and of onions ’ (AL iv 1 16.10 =
C1H 73.22).
Life-cycle of bees. For a full understanding of our text it is
necessary to have some knowledge of the life-cycle of the honeybee
— and also to consider how much early Irish beekeepers might have
known about it.
It is estimated that in summer the average modern Irish hive
contains one queen bee, about 500 males or ‘ drones ’ and about
25,000 infertile females1 or ‘ workers.’ Our text makes no distinction
between queen2, drone and worker. It is possible, however, that tarb
(lit. ‘ bull ’) in a 9th-century gloss to §25 means ‘ drone ’ (see notes
to §25a).
The sole occupation of the queen is egg-laying — in spring and
early summer she may lay up to 1,500 eggs per day. She may live for
4 or 5 years but is said to be at her best when she is 2 years old. The
workers collect nectar, pollen and water, make honey, guard and
clean the nest, and manufacture combs for the storage of honey and
the rearing of young. In spring and summer the workers die after
about 4 or 5 weeks, but in the cold part of the year they can live for as
1 Before the invention of the movable frame hive in the 19th century the
number of bees in an average hive would have been much smaller, as beekeepers
did nothing to restrict swarming.
2 In some North Welsh law-books modrydaf (lit. ‘ mother of the hive ’) seems
to refer to the queen. Her value is equal to that of the entire hive. See Appendix
7, p. 202.
46
INTRODUCTION
long as six months. The drones emerge around mid-summer and
their sole function is to mate. The large number of drones produced
each season ensures that the chance of any particular queen failing
to find a mate is very small.
In Ireland the year starts for the honeybee with the emergence of
the first flowers in February-March, when the overwintered workers
start collecting food and the queen starts laying eggs. As it takes only
21 days for an egg to develop into an adult worker, the number of
bees increases rapidly when food is abundant. This leads to overcrowding of the hive, and causes the bees to rear some new queens in
special queen cells. After this, the phenomenon of swarming is
likely to occur, if weather conditions are suitable. A swarm generally
emerges from the hive on a warm sunny day between noon and 4
p.m. (§23 na rre sorche ). The emergence of a swarm is a spectacular
sight accompanied by considerable noise. Our text — in common with
Redaction E of the Latin texts of the Welsh Laws — seems to regard
bees as particularly dangerous when emerging in a swarm. According
to bee-keepers this is not so, as the bees are normally gorged on
honey and consequently docile. However, see note to §27 i tochumlat.
The first or prime swarm of the year (§19 cetsaithe) generally
leaves the hive in May. It contains about half the bees in the hive,
with the queen. Approximately eight days after this swarm has left,
the first virgin queen of the year emerges from her cell. Within about
10 days of her emergence, she goes on her mating flight(s). In Dr.
Butler’s experience (op. cit. p. 64) she normally leaves the hive
unaccompanied by drones or workers. Occasionally, however,
she may leave in a so-called 4 mating swarm ’ together with several
hundred workers and some drones. Mating takes place in the air
within a mile or two of her hive. A queen normally mates with 5
or more drones in rapid succession, and each drone dies immediately
after mating. The mated queen usually returns to her own hive, and
starts to lay within 3 or 4 days. She has enough sperm stored in her
spermatheca to last for her lifetime, and does not mate again.
About nine days after the emergence of the first swarm, a second
swarm (known to beekeepers as the ‘ cast ’) may emerge. Casts vary
considerably in size, but are much smaller than the first swarm. An
average figure for a modern colony would be 5,000 workers with
about 100 drones and one virgin queen. Sometimes there are 3 or
4 virgin queens present but they soon fight it out, leaving one queen
to head the new colony.
INTRODUCTION
47
The second swarm is not to be confused with the exceptional
k mating swarm ’ mentioned above. In our text (§20) the second
swarm is referred to simply as tdnaise ‘ second [swarm]’. In the 9th
century B glosses, tdnaise is glossed ./. tarbsaithi ‘ bull swarm a
term which is also found in Medieval Welsh ( taruheit ) and Modern
Breton ( tarvhet ). For a discussion of this term, see notes to §25a.
The second swarm may be followed some days later by another
swarm containing about 200 workers or less, about 40 drones and
another virgin queen. Hives sometimes send out fourth and fifth
swarms which are even smaller.
According to modern bee-keepers, in a reasonably good year a
hive can send out two strong swarms.1 Provided the swarms emerge
early enough in the season, they will be capable of overwintering in
a healthy condition. Our text agrees: the first two swarms are held
to be of value (§§19-20) whereas if there is a third swarm it is called
the meraige, literally the ‘ fool ’ (§21).2 In legal commentary in
H.3.18 (Appendix 4 (c)) this swarm is referred to as the iarsaithe
lit. ‘ after-swarm ’.
When a swarm has emerged from a hive, it usually flies around
for a short time and then settles on a nearby tree, bush, or fence.
Occasionally it may settle on grass or low-growing vegetation. The
swarm stays in the same place for a few hours (or sometimes longer)
while scout bees3 choose a suitable nesting site. When this has been
done, the entire swarm moves off to its new home. The job of the
beekeeper is to try to take the swarm — before it moves off — into a
hive which he has prepared. In modern bee-keeping, a white cloth
about 4 feet square is spread on the ground near the swarm (see
Schofield: Teach Yourself Beekeeping (1958) pp. 67-9). This is the
brat scarthae 4 spread cloth ’ referred to in §§39 and 41 of our text.
1 A 13th century Anglo-Norman tract on husbandry Walter of Henley and
other treatises p. 432 (ed. Oschinsky, Oxford, 1971) states likewise that ‘ each
hive ought to answer for two swarms a year as their issue.’
2 In Herefordshire the third swarm is called the ‘ hob a word meaning
‘ fool, sprite ’ ( English Dialect Dictionary s.v. cast 10).
3 No word for ‘ scout bee ’ is recorded from O. Ir. However, in Bardic
poetry bech eolais (or eoil ) ‘ bee of guidance ’ is sometimes used as a term of
praise.^ For example, in the first poem in the Leabhar Branach (16th century)
Aodh 6 Broin is referred to as the bech eolais who guides the swarm of the poets
of Ireland ( saithe Eigios Chlair Cobhthuigh ) to one abode {a n-aonadhbha ). The
use of this metaphor suggests a knowledge of the function of scout bees (for which
see The World of the Honeybee p. 165). The term bech eolais is discussed in detail
by Padraig 6 Ciardha ( Celtica xiii 115) and we are grateful to him for the above
reference.48
INTRODUCTION
The swarm is shaken from the tree or bush into a box which is placed
face down in the centre of the cloth. Two small stones are placed
under one side of the box to allow the bees to come and go. At dusk
the beekeeper takes up the 4 corners of the cloth and ties them over
the top of the box. He then places the box in front of the prepared
hive, and arranges the cloth so that one edge almost reaches the
entrance of the hive. With a sharp jerk he then dislodges the swarm
from the box onto the cloth. If all goes well the bees (including the
queen) will crawl up into the hive and make it their home.
If the beekeeper fails to take the swarm from where it first settles
he can keep track of it as it flies and then try to remove it from its
new home. As the swarm is likely to make for an inaccessible cavity
in a tree, this may be difficult or impossible.
When dealing with tracked swarms which enter the property of
a neighbour, the text distinguishes two different situations.1 In
§§39-42 tracked bees have settled on the branches of a tree or on
open land (beich thetechtai gaibte barr . . . no maigin). In glosses and
commentary such bees are called beich fessa i mbarr chraind ‘ bees
of known origin in the branches of a tree.’ They can be captured by
their owner without damaging the neighbour’s property. In this
situation the land-owner gets one third of the honey for a year.
A different situation is covered in §§36-8. Here bees tracked by
their owner have settled in [a cavity in] a tree ( beich thetechtai
gaibte cranri) and to take possession of them would entail cutting
the tree.2 In glosses and commentary they are called beich fessa i
mbun chraind ‘ bees of known origin in the trunk of a tree.’ In this
situation it is clear that the bees are generally left in the tree, and the
bee-keeper gets one third of the honey for three years, after which
the bees and all their produce become the property of the land-owner.
From §5 it would seem that the author of our text thought that
a colony of bees was usually weak in its second year ( bliadain a
seoil) and did not send out swarms until its third year ( bliadain a sil ).
In fact, a colony may be well stocked with bees in its second year,
and may even be strong enough to send out swarms in its first year
(see notes to §5).
1 Leaving aside the distinction between land-owners of nemed and non -nemed
rank which is introduced in §42.
2 The text has a beim in chrainn , which presumably refers to quite serious
tree-cutting, such as removing a limb in which the bees have occupied a cavity.
The B glossator has a imdibe ‘ cutting around it,’ i.e. cutting the tree on either
side of the bees’ nest. See notes to §36.
INTRODUCTION
49
Finally, it is worth including here the ‘ migrating ’ or 4 hunger ’
swarm, which sometimes occurs among Western honeybees (and
much more commonly among Eastern honeybees). When a colony
is starving, all the bees may leave the hive together, and fly off to
another locality. This type of swarm is quite different from the
swarms described above which contain only a proportion of the
bees of a colony. Some time before absconding, the bees often
destroy their larvae and pupae — particularly those of the drones.
The B gloss on §25 raises the very remote possibility that
inscuchud ‘ move, departure ’ of the text refers to a migrating swarm.
Our translation of this gloss is uncertain (for discussion see note
on §25a tola tarb) but it may contain a reference to the lack of drones
in a migrating swarm.