Mad Honey - from biological weapon to aphrodisiac

Quote from Anabasis by Xenophon 410 BC [Xen. Anab. 4.8]

“After accomplishing the ascent the Greeks took up quarters in numerous villages, which contained provisions in abundance. Now for the most part there was nothing here which they really found strange; but the swarms of bees in the neighbourhood were numerous, and the soldiers who ate of the honey all went off their heads, and suffered from vomiting and diarrhoea, and not one of them could stand up, but those who had eaten a little were like people exceedingly drunk, while those who had eaten a great deal seemed like crazy, or even, in some cases, dying men. So they lay there in great numbers as though the army had suffered a defeat, and great despondency prevailed. On the next day, however, no one had died, and at approximately the same hour as they had eaten the honey they began to come to their senses; and on the third or fourth day they got up, as if from a drugging. “

One of the earliest reports of Mad Honey came from Xenophon of Athens, a student of Socrates and a Greek historian, soldier, and merce- nary. In his chronicle Anabasis, Xenophon wrote that, in 401 B.C.E., a Greek army he led was returning to Greece along the shores of the Black Sea after defeating the Persians. Near Trabzon (in Northeastern Turkey), they feasted on local honey, stolen from some nearby beehives. Hours later, the troops became disoriented and could no longer stand. By the next day, the e ects were gone, and they continued on to Greece. 

As a young boy Prof. Dr. AbulKadir Gunduz at the Karadeniz Technical University, Faculty of Medicine got poisoned. Growing up at his fathers farm at the Black Sea coast, where most farmers do some beekeeping on the side, his mother warned him not to eat too much from the freshly harvested honey. A little while later attending the family cows everything became black around him and he fainted. This sparked a lifelong fascination with honey and once he became a scientist Prof. Gunduz oversaw several animal studies in the effects of this mysterious poisonous honey. 

Locals call it ‘Deli Bal’, which translates into ‘Mad Honey’. Full time beekeepers Ozcan Demirag and his friend and neighbour Kemal Ugurlu from the village Findikli close to Rize, prefer to call it Medical Honey because of it’s healthy side effects when taken in moderate amounts. Even though a significant number of people get poisoned every year, it’s not easy to harvest Mad Honey, Ozcan reveals. Only in 2007 and 2014 he managed to get a good harvest of Deli Bal. It takes a hot and sunny Spring time with hardly any rain from the middle of April to the end of May. Otherwise the nectar of the Rhododendron flowers gets flushed out and too much diluted, resulting in less potent honey.

The honey gets poisonous when the bees collect the nectar of the Rhododendron Pontus or Luteum, with purple or yellow flowers. Known to the Turks as ‘The rose of the forrest’, these type of Rhododendrons include the Grayanotoxin in their nectar. They are early bloomers and in some Pontic area’s they are predominant. So the first honey of the season sometimes gets toxic. The yellow ones are more poison, but the bees prefer the purple ones.

Before he sells it, Ozcan is the first to taste his freshly harvested Spring honey to see if it is poisonous and how strong it is. It tastes a little bitter, will bite your tongue and burn your throat. People grow up aware to be cautious when they eat honey, especially fresh honey, because you never exactly know if and how poisonous it can be. There are no clues. Some say it tastes more bitter or it has a darker colour, but don’t let sweet light yellow honey fool you. When you get poisoned, your mind is clear but the world is spinning. The best thing to do according to Ozcan, is to close your eyes and sit still, but do not lye down and let the effect wear of. Your hearth beat will slow down, as low as 30 to 35 beats per minute and your blood pressure lower. But if you move, your hearth will start to beat really fast putting you at risk of passing out. Depending of how much you eat the effects can be healthy or dangerous. 

Taken daily in small non-toxic amounts, the honey is used as a natural treatment for hypertension because of its lowering effect on high bloodpressue. But most people buy it for another side effect. It is considered an aphrodisiac increasing sexual desire. Maybe that’s the reason why it was favoured by the Sultans of the Ottoman empire who preferred their honey from the north eastern Black Sea region possibly to attend their harems. And it’s not just folklore. Prof. Gunduz studies showed increased sexual activity in force fed rats. Prolonged use of small doses of Deli Bal increases the testosterone blood levels, thus increasing the rats sexual drive. The effect is the same on humans. But the honey has to be taken with caution. In september 2008, a Turkish married couple where hospitalised because of experimenting with the honey a little to much. They revealed they ate Deli Bal for a week for reasons of sexual performance, increasing their intake from teaspoons of honey to tablespoons. Mild headaches and dizziness at first eventually ended hearth attack like symptoms.  

All the honey in the Macahel valley is more or less poisonous. But it is safe to eat and healthy, Ozden Gulbin tells me, when the honey comes from the purple Rhododendron flowers. The yellow flowers you have to watch out for. In 2014 almost half the village of Camili was poisoned and got hospitalised. It was an exceptional warm and sunny spring, ideal conditions for Deli Bal and nearly every family had one member taken to the local clinic for a atropine treatment.

Ozden Gulbin lives with his family in the Macahel valley and breed Kafkas Queen bees (apis mellifera). Their valley, which is cut in half by the Georgian border, is the gene pool of these sought after and most popular bees species. These type of bees are the super bees of the region. They are gentile, more active and have longer proboscis - straw like tube tongues - which makes them more productive and the ideal species to collect the nectar from the Rhododendron flowers.

Macahel valley is a protected Unesco area, and no bees-hives are allowed in our out without special permission to keep the bee population genetically pure (and you need a military permit to visit the region). 

It is in a valley like this, around 65 BC, somewhere in this part of the Black Sea region, the poisonous honey was used as a trap against the Roman invaders during the reign of Mithridates VI (120-63 BC), the king of Pontus, also known as The Poison King for his abundant use of poison. Pontus was a small kingdom on the south shore of the Black Sea. Unsuspecting soldiers of Pompeii the Great, in pursuit of the retreating Pontic armies and their allies, came across strategically places hives along the road full of poisonous honey. After eating this toxic treat, being consequently incapacitated, two legions were easily slaughtered by allies of Mithridates. Thus making this episode one of the first historical accounts of biological warfare.