A person who manages and cares for colonies of honeybees, maintaining hives to produce honey and other bee products.
From 'bee' + 'keeper,' meaning one who keeps or manages bees. The occupation is ancient, dating back at least to ancient Egypt where beekeeping is depicted in tomb paintings around 2400 BCE.
Beekeepers are basically managing thousands of tiny employees—a single hive has around 60,000 bees with incredibly complex social organization. Some researchers think beekeepers understand behavior organization better than many animal scientists because bees are so intensely social.
Beekeeping professionalized as male-dominated; women's domestic/cottage apiculture erased from professional histories despite foundational contributions to modern beekeeping science.
Use 'beekeeper' neutrally; acknowledge women's historical and current roles in apiculture and agricultural science.
Women apiculturists like Renée Descartes' correspondent, and modern researchers, advanced bee genetics and ecology—credit them in professional genealogies.
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