## 5 Conclusions  
The purpose of this study was to investigate the chemical composition of honeys produced in one specific region of northern Italy from different botanical species. Melisospalynological analysis was applied to accurately ascertain the botanical origin of the investigated honey samples. Chemical characterization was carried out considering the carbohydrate content and the volatile organic compounds. The results show that the chemical composition of honey is related to its botanical origin and some parameters investigated in this paper, permitting the differentiation of the five botanical origin honeys studied. Particularly, the fructose/glucose ratio appeared to be particularly high in the acacia samples; high levels of glucose and benzaldehyde were characteristic of apple-dandelion honey. Erlose and terpineol were significantly intense in rhododendon honey while raffinose and melezitose appeared to be markers of honeyhew honey. Finally, nigerose, nonanoic acid, and furfural were significantly common in chestnut honeys. Multifloral honeys, however, had a heterogeneous chemical composition in relation to the different presence and abundance of pollens. To improve the classification of samples and test the relationship between pollens and the chemical profile of honey, all the blossom samples were subdivided on the basis of the prevalent pollen family; the relationship was investigated using a PLS-DA model which appeared to be effective in the separation of the samples and identifying common chemical characteristics among the groups. Particularly, the Ericaceae honeys (including multifloral and rhododendon honeys) were characterized by high levels of erlose, raffinose, octanoic acid, and benzeneacetaldehyde while the Rosaceae group, which included the acacia and apple-dandelion samples, was characterized by high levels of benzaldehyde and kojibiose. The f < 25 group, with all pollen family frequencies lower than 25%, showed high levels of fructose, linalool, hotrienol, and terpineol. The Fagaceae honeys (including multifloral, apple-dandelion, rhododendon, acacia, and chestnut samples) showed the presence of high levels of furfural. The results of this study highlight the weakness of the applied honey classification, both in the case of monofloral honeys, in which the characteristic pollens are often underrepresented, and of multifloral honeys, in which the pollen composition can vary a lot. The typology and abundance of pollen influence the chemical composition of honeys and, therefore, their organoleptic properties, which definitely should determine the effective commercial value. These results are based only on a limited set of samples and should be considered preliminary and relative only to the honeys collected in the studied area; our results need to be confirmed by samples collected in further years of production, in order to verify the hypothesis elaborated here. However, our study offers an interesting new point of view on the classification of honey and highlights the importance of considering the real chemical composition of honey. **Supplementary Materials:** The following supporting information can be downloaded at [[https://www.mdpi.com/article/10.3390/foods11162441/s1](https://www.mdpi.com/article/10.3390/foods11162441/s1)]([https://www.mdpi.com/article/10.3390/foods11162441/s1](https://www.mdpi.com/article/10.3390/foods11162441/s1)). Table S1: Eightty volatile organic compounds identified in the floral honey samples by HS-SPME-GC-MS, reporting retention time and molecular weight of each aromatic compound; Table S2: Mean area, standard deviation, and relative standard deviation (RSD%) of the 24 identified volatile organic compounds calculated on seven replicates (\(n=7\)) of a multifloral honey; Table S3. Melisospalynological analysis of the floral honey samples; principal (>45%) and/or accompanying pollen (15-45%) and important minor pollen types (3-15%); Figure S1: Eight less intense and not statistically significant VOCs in the honey samples. Error bars represent the standard deviations.