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The bee is an important symbol both now and in the ancient
past and not just a symbol. It is part of the theme of the harvest
that kept people from starving to death, then and now. The bee is the best of crop pollinators. Without the bee,
the harvest is diminished or fails entirely. The crops of grains such as barley, millet, and spelt fed the people through
the winter, and the bee was fed from the pollen it gathered and the honey it made.
Georges Dumezil writes
in his book Les Dieux des Germains, that in ancient Scandinavia, agriculture was considered man's work and tending
to the cattle was women's work. From this work, grain and milk and bread and cheese were provided to feed families.
Bread and cheese were the staples of life, and a little honey made it sweeter.
A popular old ballad called 'Frogge Went A-Courtin' sang
of a marriage supper, ending with the admonition:
There's bread and cheese upon the shelf, If you want any more, you can
sing it yourself! or Frog's bridle and saddle are on the shelf. If you want any more you must sing it yourself."
(http://home.earthlink.net/~highying/froggy/froggy3.html).
As people went about their tasks, the bees buzzed in the fields gathering
pollen to make honey. They were all busy trying to produce and gather food before winter arrived.
Symbolism of the Bee and the Beehive
Beyla and Byggvir might be the givers of mead and ale.
Frogge Went A Courtin'
Bees were the symbol for industriousness and productivity. They also
symbolized people who were able to work together in sweet harmony. In fact, they seemed almost like people in a village. Since
bees were busy all over the village, it could be imagined that they were like village gossips, concerned with all the goings-on.
Maybe for this reason, when important
life events such as births. deaths, and marriages occurred, people would run to the bee skeps and tell the bees.
"When there was a birth, death
or wedding in the family, the bees in the
resident hive would need to be invited to the funeral. Sometimes an
offering of wedding cake or funeral biscuits would be made. The name of
the dead would be sung to them..."
Telling the Bees, Wikipedia
Telling the Bees, a poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
In his book, Dumezil explains the word etymology of how Beyla the Bee came
about.
He begins one discussion by explaining that Beyla can be the diminutive
of the Old Icelandic word for bee - by. The Scandinavian word Beyla means milkmaid. Byggvir, seen as a partner
to Beyla, is a name which means barley personified.
From some of the words for the basic foods in life during that time came the personifications
of a milkmaid and her corresponding partner.
Folk wisdom also tied the pollinating
wind that blew over the crops and flower clusters to the bee and the barley:
"Byggvir and Beyla would be the 'Bieger' and the 'Biegung', the curver and the curved, that is the summer winds that
make foliage and flower clusters gently bend and sway" (92).
These
ancient forebears saw the natural world as completely connected. Not only did the bee provide a connection to the hardworking milkmaid
and "John Barleycorn", but these in turn were connected to the natural beauty of the curved, pollinating wind that also helped
fertilize the crop besides the bee.
These two similar
words 'Bieger' and the "Buckel" describe the troughs and crests of the waves of the sea in mild weather. So viewing
a field, gently bending in the wind also reminded the people of the natural action of the wind and waves.
The combination of the milkmaid, the plowman representing the grain harvest, and
honey from the bee produced a picture of well being and being well fed.
Gods of the Ancient Northmen By Georges Dumézil
Gods of the Ancient Germans by Georges Dumezil
The name John Barleycorn has come to mean alcohol made from grains
in modern times, but in more ancient times, John Barleycorn was the personification of grain, a harvest figure.
"There is also another story to the corn dolly which is to be found
in the folksong John Barleycorn. Three men swear that John Barleycorn must die. They take a plough and bury him alive. But
in the spring he rises through the soil. After a while he grows big and strong, even growing a beard, so the three men cut
him down at the knee, tie him on to a cart, beat him, strip the flesh off his bones and grind him between two stones. But
at the end it is John Barleycorn who defeats his opponents, proving the stronger man, by turning into beer"
John Barleycorn, song
What does the idiom mean "To cut someone off at the knee" mean?
Dumezil suggests that these two figures, Beyla and Biggvir, are "the Little Milkmaid
and Mr. Barleycorn" (or the Brewer). As symbolic figures of the harvest, they seem to correspond to the Lord and Lady of the
Harvest, and as such, are considered a married couple during the harvest celebrations.
The definition of the word virile
Dumezil also suggests that these two are essentially the same as the Eddic proper
names "Embla, the first woman, created from a certain tree (and Askr, the ash tree) which no doubt comes from elmla, almilo,
'the little elm'" (Dumezil, 101).
It is thought that Yggdrasil, the world tree in Norse legend was an ash tree. To take the metaphor further, Embla and Ask are the first two humans, as Adam and Eve. He
discusses the arrangement between Embla and Ask as the marriage between Barley and the Bee.
Mr. Barley sounds like Bartley, the last remaining son in Riders
to The Sea. It is possible that he is a symbol of a pagan harvest sacrifice.
Midsummer Night's Dream
When grain was cut and tied in sheaves at harvest time, the bound sheaf
looked something like a man, the middle part being the waist of the figure. This sheaf figure could be the symbolic Lord
of the Harvest, from which bread and beer could be made to sustain life through the winter.
The Bee Maid (also the Milk Maid) furnished mead, made from honey, and The Barley
Man (also called the Brewer) furnished beer made from grain.
George Dumezil discusses the word deigja as having the nuanced
meaning of kneading dough. His footnote #44 explains that this word is linked to the meaning "knead or shape" just as a bee
kneads and shapes its wax dwelling (Dumezil, 101).
In footnote #45, Dumezil connects Baula, the cow, with boli,
bull. This symbolic pair is tied to the fertility symbols of the harvest.
As can be seen, all these figures suggest what is most primal and necessary among
humans. They are connected both in visual symbolism and linguistically.
The sound of Baula, the cow, suggests the homonym of the English
word bough. No one knows for sure where the nursery rhyme Rock-a-bye-Baby originated, but it is possible
that the Germanic people who settled in Britain contributed to it:
"Rock-a-by baby
On the tree top,
When the wind blows
The cradle will rock.
When the bough breaks,
The cradle will fall,
And down will fall baby,
Cradle and all."
This may be a metaphor for birth or a metaphor for a cow calving as the sealed womb is opened and the calf is "dropped".
Rock-a-bye-Baby
The runes were in use until almost modern times. The runic letters
each had a literal meaning as well as a sound for each that put together could form pronounceable words and also secret meaning
used for worship and divining hidden matters.
"The first rune of all runic alphabets is Feoh...As the first character, this rune has the
meaning of cattle...Traditional society relied heavily upon the cow, for milk, meat, hide and horn" (Pennick, 89).
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