Honey appealed to two growing religions, Christianity and Islam. Christians used it to sweeten their medicines and spice their food and fermented it into intoxicating mead. In the Middle Ages, heavy drinking Bavaria, Bohemia and Baltic Europe consumed it in "industrial proportions."
Virginity-obsessed Christian theologians pronounced honey and beeswax produced by non- swarming (hence still virgin) bees sacred, and used only virtuously pure beeswax candles in Christian liturgies. Monasteries took up apiculture and produced these candles, mead and other honied by-products. Beekeepers had their special saints, including the famed "Honey-Tongued Doctor" Ambrose of Milan, and Valentine, whose feast day is famously sweetened. Unlike the wine-drinking Jesus of Nazareth and the Christian leaders who proselytized the new religion,
the Prophet Mohammed forbade his followers to consume alcohol. Muslims, their numbers ever growing, had to rely on non-alcoholic beverages. The Koran commended honey for its medicinal benefits, and mint tea, served very hot and laden with honey, was a favourite.
Honey remains an important sweetener in the Middle East, which imports it from Pakistan and the United States. Curiously, a significant source of Saudi terrorist Osama bin Laden's fortune is a vast network of honey shops.
He and his al-Qaeda associates have also concealed drugs, weapons and money in honey shipments. "Inspectors don't want to inspect that product. It's too Messy.
Virginity-obsessed Christian theologians pronounced honey and beeswax produced by non- swarming (hence still virgin) bees sacred, and used only virtuously pure beeswax candles in Christian liturgies. Monasteries took up apiculture and produced these candles, mead and other honied by-products. Beekeepers had their special saints, including the famed "Honey-Tongued Doctor" Ambrose of Milan, and Valentine, whose feast day is famously sweetened. Unlike the wine-drinking Jesus of Nazareth and the Christian leaders who proselytized the new religion,
the Prophet Mohammed forbade his followers to consume alcohol. Muslims, their numbers ever growing, had to rely on non-alcoholic beverages. The Koran commended honey for its medicinal benefits, and mint tea, served very hot and laden with honey, was a favourite.
Honey remains an important sweetener in the Middle East, which imports it from Pakistan and the United States. Curiously, a significant source of Saudi terrorist Osama bin Laden's fortune is a vast network of honey shops.
He and his al-Qaeda associates have also concealed drugs, weapons and money in honey shipments. "Inspectors don't want to inspect that product. It's too Messy.
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