The Alvearium of the “Bee-Hive” can be arbitrarily divided into two sections. The Alphabetical Section consists of an alphabetical listing of terms. These terms touch upon a wide variety of topics, including religion, ethics, governance, agriculture, the natural world, literature, and language. After Pastorius exhausted the space he allotted for his “Alphabetical Hive,” he begins the Numerical Section. This section merely continues his “Alphabetical Hive” under a different organizational principle. In this section, Pastorius abandons his alphabetical organization of terms and assigns each term a number. Numbers are then arranged in ascending order.
NB: There are two different indices that refer to this section, the Old Alvearium Index and the Octavo Index.