Telling the Bees and Other Customs

As featured in The New York Times... Throughout the history of civilisation, traditional crafts have been passed down from hand to skilled hand. Blacksmithing, brewing, beekeeping, baking, milling, spinning, knitting and weaving: these skills held societies together, and so too shaped their folklore and mythology. Exploring the folklore connected with these rural crafts, Telling the Bees examines the customs, superstitions and stories woven into some of the world's oldest trades. From the spinning of the Fates to the blacksmith's relationship with the devil, and the symbolism of John Barleycorn to a ritual to create bees from the corpse of a cow - these are the traditions upon which our modern world was built.

MARK NORMAN is a folklore author and researcher. He is a council member of The Folklore Society and has been on the judging panel for the Katharine Briggs book awards for the last 3 years. He is also the creator and host of The Folklore Podcast and Founding Curator of The Folklore Library and Archive. Listened to around the world, the podcast looks at all aspects of traditional folklore. It has received over 1.5 million downloads and is listed in the top 5% globally in its genre for audience share. Mark speaks around the country on folklore-related subjects, and also writes newspaper and magazine columns plus web articles on the subject. He lives in Devon.