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Text|Yun Xuanyi
Editor|Yun Xuanyi
introduction
Bee products have a long background in global history, with bees playing an important role in Egypt and Mesopotamia in the wider Levant, intensive beekeeping in Israel in biblical times, and the earliest beehives.
This study explores the origins of this extensive beekeeping industry through an analysis of organic residues from pottery from prehistoric sites in the southern Levant.
The use of hive products from wild bees for vessel surface treatment or as part of food is supported by comparisons with the wider archaeological record, although the true frequency of use of beeswax may be controversial.
But in stark contrast to socio-economic systems centered on domesticated resources, controlled production and standardization, wild resources seem to be more preferred, and bee products did not become an important part of the southern Levantine economic system until thousands of years later.
Explore environmental science research on the use of beeswax during the Early Bronze Age in the Southern Levant
Beeswax is used for a variety of purposes, including lighting, gluing, medicinal, artistic, pottery sealing, antiseptic, and metallurgy, honey is often used as a sweetener and preservative, but it also plays a role in medicinal and antiseptic purposes, and propolis is likewise used as a medicine and binder.
By comparing organic residues from archaeological sites with lipid profiles of modern beeswax, bee products can be identified from different data threads.
The lipid characteristics of fresh beeswax mainly include the characteristics of beeswax esters, saturated fatty acids, even aliphatic alkanes and even fatty alcohols, and long-chain even beeswax esters are the most significant signs, of which C46 is the maximum, saturated fatty acids are even and long chains, of which woody acid is the main component.
After the gradual degradation of beeswax esters, the content of palmitic acid increases, which is produced by the hydrolysis of beeswax esters palmitate, which also has an odd number of fatty alkanes, with C27 as the maximum, and even fatty alcohols, with C30 as the maximum.
Through this biomolecular approach, beeswax has been widely found in the global archaeological record, with evidence of its use as early as Middle Pleistocene Europe and South Africa, Neanderthals and anatomical modern humans using beeswax tools.
There is more evidence of widespread use of beeswax in the period from the 7th century BC to the 3rd century BC, and although no clear function has been proposed, lipid residues of beeswax have been associated with pottery from more than 50 Neolithic sites in Eurasia and North Africa.
The frequency of beeswax residues varied highly at these sites, with significant lipid yields obtained from 1% to more than 30% of the pottery tested, and the sites were distributed in areas with varying topographies and climates, indicating that bees thrive in diverse environments and niches and that their use is a common shared practice.
Although there may have been some exceptions to the Late Bronze Age in the Southern Levant, signs of beeswax use in the wider Levant region before the 3rd millennium BC were rare.
The earliest accounts of bees come from later written texts, with texts from the First Dynasty of Egypt recording the Egyptian gods as "lords of wild bees" and describing the kings of Upper and Lower Egypt as "lords of reeds and bees."
Hittite legal documents record that the fine for stealing beehives was almost equivalent to the fine for stealing sheep, while other texts imply that the Sumerians used honey as a religious offering.
The site includes several beehives formed by hollow ceramic cylinders that produce hundreds of kilograms of honey per year, which have been confirmed as beehives, which were analysed by organic residues.
Other contemporaneous or slightly earlier examples of beeswax have recently been found in the Southern Levant, which are based on lipids preserved in pottery and characterized by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry.
Some of these identifications rely primarily or exclusively on the characteristics of beeswax alkanes, the identification of which may be uncertain, and highly degradable beeswax has been found at the late Iron Age II site in Israel's Jezreel Valley and is thought to have been probably used to cover or seal coffins.
Similar signs have been found at late Iron Age III sites in the valley, thought to be associated with honey artifacts, and this clay pot may have been used to store honey.
Some signs of beeswax have been found at Iron Age II sites in north-central Jordan, and these clay pots are often associated with liquid storage, so beeswax may have been used as a sealant, or this jar may have been used to store honey.
The study is part of a broader analysis of organic residues from 247 pottery from 15 prehistoric sites in Israel, focusing on Bronze Age pottery, Middle Bronze Age and Late Bronze Age, as well as several Neolithic pottery analyses.
At the end of the period, important socio-economic transformations and technological advances took place, such as the development of olive gardening, intensive use of secondary products, specialization of processes and the introduction of copper metallurgy.
The findings were discussed alongside previously published research to explain why bee products were used during this period and, more importantly, why this versatile resource appears to be underestimated.
Environmental scientific research on the lipid characterization of beeswax in pottery from the prehistoric Southern Levant
In the course of the broader study, pottery samples were taken from geographically and chronologically diverse sites, samples were selected from ongoing excavations and artifacts in the collection of the Israel Antiquities Agency.
In previous studies in the Southern Levant, beeswax was found to be inconsistent in specific task and non-specialized vessel forms, such as bowls, jars, trumpets, communion cuplets, bottles, and lamps, sampling a variety of common vessel forms commonly found at prehistoric sites and also including fragments of unidentified types.
After cleaning the initial surface layer to eliminate potential exogenous contamination, approximately 1-2 g of ceramic powder was collected from the inner surface of each vessel and sampled using a modeling drill with a tungsten steel drill bit.
Attachments on the inner surface were also homogenized and analyzed, and soil samples were collected from ceramic powder on the outer surface or from the soil layer in which the ceramics were located to be tested as control samples for exogenous and post-sedimentation contamination.
The glassware was sterilized prior to use, a high-performance LC grade solvent was used, and a process blank sample was performed to monitor laboratory contamination while lipids were extracted.
The two-step method was chosen to restore the "unbound" lipid fraction by solvent extraction and subsequent saponification of the internal sample to release the "bound" lipid fraction over direct acidified methanol extraction to ensure that wax esters and acylglycerol can be analyzed prior to hydrolysis.
The lipids were extracted by the solvent extraction method of dichloromethane:methanol three times, supplemented by ultrasonic waves and centrifugation, and the solvent was slightly heated and dried with a slight flow of nitrogen to obtain a total lipid extract.
A known amount of n-trihexadecane was added to the sample for TLE quantification; It was later discovered that n-trihexadecane was sometimes co-washed with other molecules, so the method was changed and systematically run in GC-MS sequences after every four samples for more accurate quantification.
After solvent extraction, the lipids bound to the ceramic matrix were saponified using 4 ml of 0.5 M sodium hydroxide solution, and the neutral fraction was extracted three times using cyclohexane without further analysis.
For the remaining sodium hydroxide solution, 2 ml of 1 M hydrochloric acid is added until pH3 is reached, the acidic fraction is extracted three times using cyclohexane, followed by methylesterification using 250 μl of trifluoroboronethol solution.
The sample was run as methyl ester, and as with the solvent extract, a known amount of n-trihexadecane was initially added to the sample for TLE quantification, and later only C36n-alkane was run externally after every four archaeological samples.
Environmental scientific research on the lipid characterization of beeswax in pottery in the prehistoric Southern Levant: analysis and identification of bee products in pottery
As expected, low lipid preservation due to the Mediterranean climate and alkaline soils typical of the Southern Levant region promoted microbial activity and, accordingly, lipid degradation.
Of the 247 pottery tested, only 22 pottery interiors and one calcified crust produced lipids of more than 5 mcg^-1 after solvent extraction, considered explainable residues.
Although originally sampled as a control sample, there are seven additional pottery with lipids over 5 μg^-1 on the outside, which may be related to leakage or, more likely, the application of treatments to the container surface or porosity.
The lipid yield of the combined acidic fraction was much higher, with 47% of the internal layers and crusts of the pottery tested containing more than 5 μg^-1 of lipids.
The evidence for biomarkers associated with beeswax is described in detail below, including even-numbered long-chain saturated fatty acids, odd-numbered long-chain alkanes, even-numbered long-chain alcohols, and beeswax palmitate.
Beeswax markers did not appear in other different forms of pottery analyzed, including bowls, open jars, bow-edge jars, spouted jars, trays, stirrers, conical jars, and filters.
No beeswax markers were found when analyzed in the six conical tanks, although earlier studies provided positive confirmation based on alkane profiles.
This suggests that if the conical jar is used as a candle, other fuel sources besides beeswax are used, and the beeswax biomarker in the conical jar may be related to a completely different use of beeswax as a sealant for drinking utensils.
Some lipid compounds indicate contributions from animal fats and vegetable oils, and the presence of cholesterol may indicate the recycling of animal fats.
No markers of cholesterol degradation were found, so contamination may be suggested, although no other contaminants from human exposure were found, and based on odd and branched-chain fatty acids in acidity fraction and large amounts of C18:0, rumen fats can be specifically inferred.
Odd and branched-chain fatty acids are produced by bacteria in the rumen, and the presence of vegetable oils is indicated by unsaturated fatty acids in solvent extracts and unsaturated fatty acids in acidic fractions, although small amounts of C18:1 are also found in animal fats, including cetytenone-31 and trihexakete-31.
There were many of the same molecules in the external control sample, but in negligible amounts, suggesting that lipids may have migrated through the pottery structure and that the lipid signature inside was not due to late deposition contamination. This includes C16:0, C18:0, alkanes, even-numbered alcohols, and beeswax palmitate.
summary
This study provides direct evidence for the use of beeswax during the early Copperstone Age in the Southern Levant, and speculates on the possibility that beeswax and honey may have been used in the Copperstone in the Southern Levant.
The results consider preservation issues, discreetly suggesting that beeswax products were not frequently produced and used during the Copperstone Age, and that beekeeping was not evident until the Iron Age.
The pottery tested here marks early evidence of residues of bee products in ceramics, but it by no means represents the starting point when beekeeping became widespread thousands of years after the end of the Copperstone Age.
Further analysis of other pottery from Bronze Age sites is needed to illuminate the trajectory of beekeeping in the region and determine when bees became an important part of the economy.
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