BEES
Apes
IMAGE SOURCE · WIKIMEDIA COMMONS · RIGHTS · COMMONS PUBLIC-DOMAIN FILE
COMMONS FILE PAGE ↗
MANUSCRIPT WITNESS
Isidore files bees under small flying creatures. He also reports, as a view held by “many”, that they are born from the carcasses of cattle.
Many say that bees are born from the carcasses of cattle.
THE LAYERS · KEPT DISTINCT
ISIDOREETYMOLOGIAE XII.8.1–3
He explains the name apes two ways: bees bind themselves together by the feet, or they are born without feet. They are builders who make combs from many flowers, keep armies and kings, wage battles and flee smoke. Hornets, drones and wasps get parallel origins from other carcasses.
MANUSCRIPT WITNESSABERDEEN MS 24 · f.63r
The Aberdeen Bestiary carries the same account, including the etymology and the cattle-carcass birth. Its miniature shows identical bees flying into coiled straw skeps in orderly rows.
HOW WE KNOW WHAT WE THINK WE KNOW
Isidore XII.8.1–3 checked in two editions.
Aberdeen f.63r heading, text summary and miniature checked on the folio page.
Wikimedia Commons file of the f.63r miniature, marked public domain (PD-Art).
The card used to say VERIFIED IMAGE before any file was confirmed. That label is now earned.
Record levels, status labels, the streams diagram and the interface framing are authored by Make It Believable. They are not historical testimony.
WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW YET
- Which earlier source Isidore took the carcass story from. Not yet sourced.
- The exact last folio of the bees section.