ABSTRACT
Figure 6.3b shows a goddess in the shape of a bee depicted between 4000 and 3500 BC. Rock paintings of honey-getting from bees' nests were made earlier, in Mesolithic times, and Chapters 6-8 and 10 show examples. In Southern Africa, San people made many rock paintings of bees and their nests (Section 8.11) and often superimposed one painting on an earlier one, but they never overpainted subjects that
Certain peoples in South America had extraordinary and intimate relationships with the stingless bees that lived in their area, and what was harvested from them. This was true, for instance, of the Kayap6 in the Amdzonjungle of Brazil, the Guayaki in Paraguay, and the Mataco in the Gran Chaco of Bolivia (Sections 11.43 and 17 .22). Religions ofthese peoples involved bees and provided both positive guidance and taboos for interactions with the bees.
