Man of Bicorp Cave Painting

The taste of honey has entranced humans as long as we’ve walked upright—it is the second sweetest thing found in nature after dates. Until relatively recently, bees were the primary source of both sweetness, as honey, and light, in the form of beeswax candles. But before we domesticated them, getting hold of the sugary treat was a risky business.

Thousands of years ago, our prehistoric ancestors would teeter on rickety ladders to swipe honeycomb from wild bees nesting in cliff faces. In this Gastropod episode listen to author Gene Kritsky introduce us to the cave painting in the Cueves de la Arana (“Spider Caves”) in Bicorp, Spain that is the oldest evidence of humans’ love affair with honey.