offered as a fine gift to pharaohs, priestesses, and gods and was included among the possessions of those entering the afterlife (“Here’s to your ghost” was a popular toast). It is thought that in Egyptian culture, if a woman drank beer offered by a man, they were then married (think of all the people you’d be married to if that were still true, ladies). Beer was also used as medicine to treat patients and sometimes as payment for laborers instead of money.
Around 330 BCE, beer moved from Egypt to the Greeks, who had mainly been wine drinkers. The Greeks called their beer Zythos and were slow to embrace beer with open arms because they associated the drink with less-refined segments of society. The Greeks most likely taught the Romans how to brew. Romans are known for their love of wine, but they happily added beer to their beverage list. Our modern word beer comes from the Latin bibere , which means “to drink.” Pliny the Elder, a prolific Roman who wrote on many subjects, included notes on beer in his works. Julius Caesar was said to be a fan of a good brew, and legend tells that he toasted the crossing of the Rubicon with a cup of ale. The Romans then probably passed their beer recipes on to the Britons around 55 BCE, and the Britons would grow to love it more than wine.
The early Christians really took to beer. The monks got into brewing and found a certain calling, so to speak. The monastery was often the brewery and inn of the olden days. Pilgrims passing through town were offered a pint and a room by the monks as a respite from their journey. Beer in medieval times was a currency, sometimes used as a payment or tax. While good beer was considered a gift from the heavens, bad batches of beer were seen as the devil’s work because the science of beer was not yet fully understood. In the 1500s, women were burned if they were thought to be brew witches, satanic souls who were responsible for bad beer (can you imagine a man tasting the beer, declaring it was sour, and then perusing the drinking crowd for a poor lady who would be deemed responsible?).
The Pilgrims included beer among their necessities, and running out of beer was one of the deciding factors for stopping at Plymouth Rock, as we learned from William Bradford’s History of Plymouth Plantation : “We could not take much time for further search, our victuals being much spent, especially beer.” Female Pilgrims homebrewed for the family, using whatever ingredients they could find in the new land. Native Americans introduced corn to the Pilgrims, and this became a useful ingredient when barley was scarce.
During the 1500s, hops started to be regularly added to beer, and recipes began to take on more variety. (Though hops had been used for a long time in certain parts of the world, it wasn’t yet commonplace or required.) With hops, beer got better (fewer beer witches were burned, thank God). The hops were revered for their preservative quality, and the hopped beer started to replace the beer made with gruit , an herb mixture used to flavor beer. As some countries tried to hold on to the tradition of hop-free beer, the public found new love for the drier drink. The Germans, as we mentioned in Chapter 1, passed the famous Reinheitsgebot, requiring all beer be made with only malt, water, and hops (they didn’t know about the details of yeast yet). The Germans also began to lager beers, storing the beer at cool temperatures and creating a style that would become the new favorite. In the 1840s, the first Pilsner was born in Plzen, Bohemia, and the lager style flourished. In America in the 1800s, the influx of German immigrants brought with them new styles, like the Weiss beer and the lagering method of fermentation. Americans soon began to brew these lighter styles instead of the common Porter of the time.
In 1876, Louis Pasteur brought beer forward by describing the basis for fermentation in his work Etudes sur la Bière (Studies on Beer). In it,
Around 330 BCE, beer moved from Egypt to the Greeks, who had mainly been wine drinkers. The Greeks called their beer Zythos and were slow to embrace beer with open arms because they associated the drink with less-refined segments of society. The Greeks most likely taught the Romans how to brew. Romans are known for their love of wine, but they happily added beer to their beverage list. Our modern word beer comes from the Latin bibere , which means “to drink.” Pliny the Elder, a prolific Roman who wrote on many subjects, included notes on beer in his works. Julius Caesar was said to be a fan of a good brew, and legend tells that he toasted the crossing of the Rubicon with a cup of ale. The Romans then probably passed their beer recipes on to the Britons around 55 BCE, and the Britons would grow to love it more than wine.
The early Christians really took to beer. The monks got into brewing and found a certain calling, so to speak. The monastery was often the brewery and inn of the olden days. Pilgrims passing through town were offered a pint and a room by the monks as a respite from their journey. Beer in medieval times was a currency, sometimes used as a payment or tax. While good beer was considered a gift from the heavens, bad batches of beer were seen as the devil’s work because the science of beer was not yet fully understood. In the 1500s, women were burned if they were thought to be brew witches, satanic souls who were responsible for bad beer (can you imagine a man tasting the beer, declaring it was sour, and then perusing the drinking crowd for a poor lady who would be deemed responsible?).
The Pilgrims included beer among their necessities, and running out of beer was one of the deciding factors for stopping at Plymouth Rock, as we learned from William Bradford’s History of Plymouth Plantation : “We could not take much time for further search, our victuals being much spent, especially beer.” Female Pilgrims homebrewed for the family, using whatever ingredients they could find in the new land. Native Americans introduced corn to the Pilgrims, and this became a useful ingredient when barley was scarce.
During the 1500s, hops started to be regularly added to beer, and recipes began to take on more variety. (Though hops had been used for a long time in certain parts of the world, it wasn’t yet commonplace or required.) With hops, beer got better (fewer beer witches were burned, thank God). The hops were revered for their preservative quality, and the hopped beer started to replace the beer made with gruit , an herb mixture used to flavor beer. As some countries tried to hold on to the tradition of hop-free beer, the public found new love for the drier drink. The Germans, as we mentioned in Chapter 1, passed the famous Reinheitsgebot, requiring all beer be made with only malt, water, and hops (they didn’t know about the details of yeast yet). The Germans also began to lager beers, storing the beer at cool temperatures and creating a style that would become the new favorite. In the 1840s, the first Pilsner was born in Plzen, Bohemia, and the lager style flourished. In America in the 1800s, the influx of German immigrants brought with them new styles, like the Weiss beer and the lagering method of fermentation. Americans soon began to brew these lighter styles instead of the common Porter of the time.
In 1876, Louis Pasteur brought beer forward by describing the basis for fermentation in his work Etudes sur la Bière (Studies on Beer). In it,
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