Beehives

 

The properties of bees are wonderful noble and worthy. For bees have one common kind as children, and dwell in one habitation, and are closed within one gate: one travail is common to them all, one meat is common to them all, one common working, one common use, one fruit and flight is common to them all, and one generation is common to them all.

De proprietatibus rerum

This list of beehives includes depictions of skeps and tile hives.

For more links on bees, beehives, beekeeping, and apiculture in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, click here.

An Anglo-Saxon charm for a swarm of bees

Bees, Exultet (BNF NAL 710), 1136 

A beekeeper releases bees from a sack to a beehive, Worksop Bestiary (PML M.81, fol. 58r), c. 1185

Bees, The Aberdeen Bestiary (fol. 63r), c. 1200 

Bees, a bestiary (BNF Lat. 6838 B, fol. 29r), 13th century

Beehive, a bestiary (Bodl. 764, fol. 89r), second quarter of the 13th century

Bees and a beehive, a theological miscellany (Brit. Lib. Harley 3244, fol. 57v), c. 1236-1275 

Beekeeping, Bestiary of Love (BNF Fr. 1444, fol. 260r), second half of the 13th century 

A man tries to catch a swarm of bees in a bag, The Maastricht Hours (Brit. Lib. 17, fol. 148r), c. 1310-1320 

Veiled beekeper hangs a drum near a beehive, psalter (Douce 6, fol. 136v), c. 1320-1330

Beehive with bees, Luttrell Psalter (Brit. Lib. Add. 42130, fol. 204r), c. 1325-1340 

Fols. 38, 164, & 200, Concordantiae caritatis (Lilienfeld Stiftsbibliothek 151), c. 1349-1351

Beehives, Tacuinum Sanitatis (ÖNB 2644), c. 1370-1400

Honey, Tacuinum Sanitatis (Casanatense 4182, fol. 27), late 14th century

Harvesting honey, Tacuinum Sanitatis (BNF NAL 1673, fol. 82), c. 1390-1400

Detail from February in the Très riches heures du Duc de Berry, c. 1412-16

Honey, Tacuinum Sanitatis (BNF Lat. 9333, fol. 91v), 15th century 

Bees, De proprietatibus rerum (Musée Condé MS 339, fol. 155v), 15th century

Bees, The Bestiary of Anne Walsh (Kongelige Bibliotek, Gl. kgl. S. 1633 4, fol. 47r), 15th century 

A bear with bees and beehives, Flore de virtu e de costumi (Brit. Lib. Harley 3448, fol. 10v), second quarter of the 15th century 

Beehives, an herbal (Brit. Lib. Sloane 4016, fol. 57v), c. 1440 

Bees, De proprietatibus rerum (BNF Fr. 136, fol. 16), c. 1445-1450 

Bees, Book of simple medicines (BNF NAF 6593, fol. 137v), 1452 

Beekeeping, Georgica (BNF Lat. 7939 A, fol. 38v), 1458 

Bees, Book of simple medicines (BNF Fr. 1310, fol. 26v), mid-15th century

David attacks a lion whose forepaws are on an overturned beehive, Hours of Englebert of Nassau (Douce 220, fol. 184r), c. 1470-1490

A beehive (Brit. Lib. Burney 272, fol 43v), c. 1473

Bees, Book of simple medicines (BNF Fr. 1307, fol. 183), c. 1480

Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (Grand Palais 13-560774, 53 LR), 15th century

St. Christopher by Hieronymus Bosch 

A fable about bees and hives, works of Erasmus (Musée Condé MS 316, fol. 28v), 16th C

Cupid the Honey Thief by Albrecht Dürer, 1514

Bees, Book of simple medicines (BNF Fr. 12322, fol. 193v), c. 1520-1530 

Bears devour the honey from hives, Fleur de vertu (BNF Fr. 1877, fol. 21v), 1530

Venus and Cupid by Lucas Cranach the Elder, 1531 

Compound glyph (Codex Mendoza, fol. 13r, 16r), 1541

Alciato's Emblems: Lez choses doulces quelque fois deviennent amères and Presque le semblable, extrait de Theocrit, 1549

Compound glyph (Telleriano-Remensis Codex, MS Mexicain 385 fol. 40r), 1550

Stained-glass design for a married couple by Hieronymus Lang, 1553

Compound glyph (Matrícula de Huexotzinco, fol. 737v), 1560 

Simplex glyphs (Matrícula de Huexotzinco, fol. 483r, 615v, 679r, 736r, and 843v), 1560 

The Beekeepers and the Birdnester by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, c. 1568 

Iconography (Florentine Codex fol. 99v and 99r) 

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