Beekeeping in Iron Age Northern Italy. A multianalytical investigation on honeycomb remains from the Forcello Etruscan harbour.

In ancient and historical times, beeswax and honey were raw materials of crucial interest for a variety of activities from handcrafting to nutritional purposes. Rich iconographic and literary evidence of beekeeping exist, while archaeological data are strongly underrepresented. An excavation campaign in the Etruscan Forcello settlement (540 -495 BC Bagnolo San Vito, Mantua province, Italy) led to the discovery of a craftsman workshop with residues interpreted as honeycombs, beebreads (pellets of pollen packed by honeybees and used as protein source for larvae) and Apis mellifera bodies, in connection with containers made in Abies alba wood and embedded in lumps of a dark solid material. These materials were charred during a fire involving the settlement in the 510-495 B.C.E. A multianalytical investigation was carried out on these materials in order to confirm their origin. We compared the results with those achieved by analyzing fresh and charred reference beeswax. An heating experiment was also set up on fresh beebreads from a modern honeycomb to check morphological and color variations in pollen grains under increasing temperatures, to be compared with fossil evidence from the Forcello site. Thanks to infrared spectroscopy we were able to primarily distinguish proteinaceous residues from waxes and tar, and to reconstruct the formation of the dark solid material recovered in the site. Advanced mass spectrometric techniques such as GCMS, APCI/MS and LC-ESI-QToF were employed to identify the known beeswax biomarkers such as wax monoesters, odd numbered n-alkanes, long chain fatty acid and alcohols. Analysis of beebreads is in progress and will provide data on honeybees floral preferences and feeding behavior. The investigation provided useful information about the practice of production and the storing of the beeswax in the site.