Here is an abstract of a paper on honey in the British Journal of Nutrition
(Brit J Nutrition 1996, 75, 513-520) that was posted on another list, and
crossposted here with permission in an edited form....

>Synopsis:
>In pre-industrial times, honey was the main source of concentrated
>sweetness in the diets of many peoples.  There are no precise figures for per capita
>consumption during most periods in history because honey was part of either a
>hunter/gatherer or subsistence economy.  Until now, historians and food
>writers have proposed that it was a scarce commodity available only to a
>wealthy few. We do know, however, that in a cash economy honey was sold in
>large units (gallons and even barrels) and it was present in such abundance that mead
>was a common alcoholic drink made from honey.  A reappraisal of the
>evidence in the Stone-Age, Antiquity, the Middle Ages and early Modern
>times suggests that ordinary people ate much larger quantities of honey than has previously been
>acknowledged.  Intakes at various times during history may well have rivalled
>our current consumption of refined sugar.  There are implications therefore
>for the role of sugar in modern diets.  Refined sugar may not have
>displaced more nutrient rich items from our present day diets but only the
>nutritionally comparable food, honey.

Below is the text about modern hunter-gatherer diets.

>Modern hunter-gatherers
>Unfortunately, quantitative studies of hunter-gatherer diets are scarce. We
>know that for the Hazda of Tanzania 'meat plus honey' constitute 20% of food
>eaten by weight (Woodburn 1963). The remainder of the diet is of vegetable
>origin and so in energy terms 'meat plus honey' will contribute much more
>than 20%. The Mbuti pygmies of the Congo obtain as much as 80% of their
>dietary energy from honey during the honey season (Crane 1983), but this
>lasts for only two months of the year (Turnbull 1963).
>
>The Veddas or Wild Men of Sri Lanka esteem honey so highly that they
>regularly risk their lives to obtain it  (Crane 1983). The local bees often
>nest in crevices on rock faces and these men will lower themselves into the
>ravine suspended by only a bamboo ladder. The Veddas sometimes fill a
>hollow tree trunk with honey and then place flesh in it as a means of
>preserving the meat for times of scarcity. This is certainly suggestive of
>plentiful supplies of honey.

>In the New World, the Guayaki Indians of Paraguay have honey as the very
>basis of their diet and culture (Crane 1975). Vellard reports that, 'one
>group of fifteen people had seven large vessels holding at least forty
>litres altogether.' Unfortunately we do not know how long this was to last
>them nor how many people were to partake of it.

>Many Australian Aboriginal tribes regard the honey of the native bee as
>'the supreme delicacy' (Low 1989). In the rest of the world it is usually
>the males of a tribe who hunt for honey, but amongst some Australian
>Aborigines this task
>falls to the women. One method they employ involves capturing a bee and
>attaching a small feather to its body, so that on release it can be more
>easily
>seen and followed all the way back to the nest. On removing the contents,
>Australian Aborigines eat everything - honey, wax, dead bees and brood
>(which provides protein) - with relish.
>
>In 1972-3 Meehan lived for a year with the native Anbarra people of
>Northern Australia (Meehan 1982). Over four one-month periods, chosen to be
>representative of the different tropical seasons, she recorded the weights
>of foods consumed. The results indicate an average intake of 2 kg honey per
>person
>per year. However, Meehan points out that the wet season that year was
>unusually
>long and this may have diminished honey foraging activity.  In addition,
>this group of Anbarra had supplies of store food (providing 35-58% of
>dietary energy) including refined sugar, which may have reduced the
>incentive to go about the tricky and time-consuming activity of tracking
>down bees' nests.
>
>The bees of the New World are stingless but may bite or burn with caustic
>liquids anyone who threatens the nest. Yet neither this, nor the stings of
>Old World bees deter a hunter-gatherer in pursuit of honey. The amount of
>honey available from one region to the next will vary greatly depending on
>the extent
>to which the environment suits bee activity. The evidence suggests that the
>amount eaten by 'Stone-Age' people was limited only by how much was
>available in their surroundings.
>
>The Bushmen of South Africa lay claim to no personal possessions of any
>type, except that is, for bees' nests (Free 1982). Perhaps it was to reduce
>the likelihood of such a nest being robbed that a man first carried it, in
>its hollow log, back from the forest to a place near his dwelling. Perhaps
>that year was favourable for his bees, which in their excess numbers
>swarmed, coming finally to rest in a clay pot their owner had discarded in
>the grass, thus unknowingly inventing the first man-made hive.

Cheers,
Kirt