Ever since men first hunted for honeycomb in rocks and daubed pictures of it on cave walls, the honeybee has been seen as one of the wonders of nature: social, industrious, beautiful, terrifying. This book recounts the weird and wonderful things that humans believed about bees and their society through the ages. It is also a history of ideas, taking us through the evolution of science, religion and politics, and a social history which explores the bee's impact on food and human ritual.