“…they fly now here, now there, feeding on honey-comb and bringing all things to pass.” Homeric Hymns, translated by H.G. Evelyn-White
Melissa means bee in Greek, and beekeeping is one of the oldest crafts on earth. The original psychopompos, those gods who can transport souls to the afterlife and travel unimpeded between the realms, were bees. Melissae (the Mother Bee’s priestesses) help souls to the afterlife. With honey on their lips, Melissae speak prophecy and tell people the truth about existence. The Pythia at Apollo’s oracle at Delphi, in addition to Kore and Demeter at Eleusis, were called Melissae. Surviving death and securing a good afterlife was a primary reason for attending the Eleusinian Mysteries. Melissae were the experts at this.
There are many examples of bees rendered in art and jewelry from the ancient world. The complex at Delphi was shaped like a bee hive. Some tombs had burial chambers within them modeled after the hexagons of a honeycomb. Mead, fermented honey, predates even wine and beer.
The Pure Mother Bee, Potnia, is a very old triple goddess (maiden, mother, crone), who predates Zeus, and is the likely prototype for Demeter. She taught prophecy to Apollo; therefore, she also predates him. Since Apollo taught this wisdom to Hermes, she is older than Hermes as well, probably much older. Bees are the original psychopompos, (which means they transport souls to the underworld, Hermes title and function), because they can make it back. As insects, Bees simply fly through the gates unnoticed. A very early Sumerian myth about Inanna features two insects that can fly to the Underworld undetected carrying the food and the water of life. This is a very old idea that shows up in many myths and cultures.
One of the foundational ideas of the novel, Eleusis, is that there were many female gods before the era of the Olympians who were changed into males or overthrown by male gods. After male gods subsumed the female versions, it was said that traversing the realms was the sole provenance of Hermes. One of the conceits of the novel is that the patriarchal overthrow was a gradual process, one that took thousands of years, and began with male gods taking over the roles of older, female gods. There was a time before father gods, and it likely lasted tens of thousands of years, so what might it have been like? The Mother Bee holds the answer to the most essential question facing mortals: What happens when we die?