Gene Kritsky

A look at bees and bee keeping in ancient Egypt.
This is a fascinating topic and before hearing about this book I had no idea how important bees were in ancient Egypt. The book covers a lot of ground in just 133 pages, the first half mostly covers artistic and hieroglyphic representations of bees in tombs and various artifacts, and while much of that was interesting the presentation was a bit dry and repetitive. The second half dealt more with the actual practice of bee keeping and what little we know about how they did this and the role honey played in their culture. This part felt a bit more dynamic than the first, though a bit slight most likely owing to just how relatively few records from that time period survived into our times.
A good book for those already familiar with Egypt and hieroglyphs but probably a bit dry and slow for the average reader, it took me way longer to get through than a 133 page book should have.… (mehr)