Beer - As Old as Civilization
Or, should that be, Civilization - As Old as Beer? ... The pursuit of beer changed the course of humanity forever. In 5000 BC. Neolithic people abandoned their wandering lives for farming, to grow grain for brewing beer... read more from the New York Times, March 24, 1987

The oldest proven records of brewing date back 6,000 years ago to the Middle East. Archeologists uncovered a seal from the Sumerian peoples who lived between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The seal is dedicated to the goddess of brewing and contains a recipe for making beer. There's a pictograph of bread being baked, crumbled into water to form a mash and then made into a drink that is recorded to have left people feeling "wonderful and blissful."

By 3000 BC, the Egyptians, who grew many kinds of grain, were brewing at least six different types of beer. The Egyptian pyramids were built on beer. Stonecutters, slaves and public officials were paid in a type of beer called 'kash' – which is where the word 'cash' originated. They worshipped Isis, the goddess of fertility & beer. Beer was used to treat over 100 illnesses. Their Beer of Kings was a sophisticated brew ... read more from the New York Times, July 26, 1996

The King of Babylon, 4000 years ago, wrote purity and content laws for beer. Brewers who diluted their product were imprisoned in their own vats. In Babylonia beer was safer to drink than the canal water and barley and beer were used as a form of currency.

An ancient tablet, now in New York's Metropolitan Museum, lists Babylonian beers as: dark beer, pale beer, red beer, three fold beer, beer with a head, without a head etc. It also records that beer was sipped through a straw - in the case of royalty a golden straw, long enough to reach from the throne to a large container of beer kept nearby. In ancient times beer was cloudy and unfiltered. The "drinking straws" were used to avoid getting the brewing residue, which was very bitter, in the mouth. 

In Babylon it was customary for the bride's father to supply his new son-in-law with all the mead he could drink. As mead is a honey beer and their calendar was lunar based, this period was called the 'honey month' – or what we know today as the 'honeymoon'. Babylonians believed if the groom drank mead for an entire month, it enhanced the chances of his wife bearing a male heir.

Assyrian tablets from 2000 BC stated that Noah was carrying beer aboard the Ark.

In 1116 BC, Chinese imperial edict stated that heaven required people to drink beer.

Saint Arnold, a bishop born in 580, is considered the patron saint of beer. Throughout his life, Arnold, Bishop of Metz, lectured the peasants on the benefits of drinking beer, which was made safe by boiling and processing. "Don't drink the water," he urged, "drink the beer." He is credited with the famous words, "From man's sweat and God's love, beer came into the world." So strong was his faith in beer power that, in the midst of a plague, he plunged his crucifix into a brew kettle and persuaded the locals to drink only from that "holy" vessel. His action stopped the spread of illness. When Saint Arnold died in 640, the citizens of his hometown carried his body from Remiremont to Metz for reburial in their church. On this journey, another miracle occurred – when the weary porters stopped to share their only mug of beer, they discovered the mug never ran dry.

Saint Nicholas (Santa Claus) is listed by the Catholic Church as a Patron Saint of Brewing.

In the Finnish poetic saga Kalewala, 400 verses are devoted to beer but only 200 were needed for the creation of the earth. According to the Edda, the great Nordic epic, wine was reserved for the gods, beer belonged to mortals and mead to inhabitants of the realm of the dead.

Viking women in Norse society at the end of the first millennium were the only ones allowed to brew beer. According to law, brewing equipment could only be used by women.

Noresmens' early epic poems boast of conquest, and of drinking ale from their enemies skulls. After consuming buckets of aul (or ale), the Vikings would head fearlessly into battle, often without armour or even shirts. In fact, "berserk" means "bare shirt" in Norse, and eventually took on the meaning of their wild battles.

The familiar Scandinavian toast sköl derives from scole, the drinking bowl shaped like the upper half of a human skull. Originally, these bowls were fashioned from the actual skulls of enemy killed in battle.

During the Middle Ages, when monks were brewing their beer in their monasteries, each monk was allowed to drink 5 quarts of beer a day. Fasting monks subsisted solely on beer.

Problems with brewing were often blamed on “Beer Witches.” Women were burned at the stake because it was  believed their evil spells had caused a good batch of brew to be ruined! The last known burning of a brew witch took place in 1591. The use of hops put an end to this horrific practice. Hops made beer less perishable and the brewing process more stable.

During Medieval times beer was used for tithing, trading, payment and taxing.

Whoever serves beer or wine watered down, he himself deserves in them to drown."
-Medieval plea for pure libations

In eleventh-century England, a bride would distribute ale to her wedding guests in exchange for donations to the newlyweds. This brew, known as Bride Ale, is the origin of the word 'bridal'.

In the 13th century, King Wenceslas II convinced the Pope to revoke an order banning the brewing of beer in Czech territories (no wonder he was known as 'Good King Wenceslas).

It was customary in the 13th century to baptize children with beer.

In olde England, town inns paid a government tax known as a 'scot' for serving beer. Beer lovers who left town to drink at rural pubs were said to be drinking 'scot free'.

Beer wasn't sold in bottles until 1850. Beer lovers would visit their local tavern with a special bucket, have it filled and then begin the merry journey home.

The British Army supplied its men with a cash allowance for beer, considered a vital nutritional staple on long overseas missions. With this allowance of one penny, soldiers enjoyed six pints of ale every day.

In the 1490's Columbus found Indians making beer from corn and black birch sap.

The first beer brewed in New World was at Sir Walter Raleigh's colony in Virginia in 1587--but the colonists sent requests to England for better beer.

The pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock because they ran out of beer. Although they planned to continue down the east coast, the Mayflower's log reads "For we could not now take time for further search (to land our ship), our victuals being much spent, especially our beere." The passengers "were hasted ashore and made to drink water that the seamen might have the more beere".

On their arrival, the pilgrims immediately built a common house, which included a brewery.

The music for "The Star Spangled Banner" was derived from a British drinking song called "Anacreon".

Universities in Europe and America from the 1300s through the 1700s had in-house breweries to provide beer to the students. Harvard had its own brew house in 1674 and five beer halls, each burned down by rioting divinity students.

King Frederick the Great once banned coffee to bolster sagging beer sales, saying, "It is disgusting to note the increase in the quantity of coffee used by my subjects and the amount of money that goes out of the country in consequence. Everybody is using coffee. If possible, this must be prevented. My people must drink beer."

A flood of beer swept through the streets of St. Giles, England, on 17 October 1814. Caused by a rupture in a brewery tank containing 3500 barrels of beer, the tidal wave killed nine people and demolished two houses.

In 1876 Pasteur unraveled the secrets of yeast in the fermentation process, and he also developed pasteurization to stabilize beers 22 years before the process was applied to milk.

In 1909 Teddy Roosevelt brought over 500 gal. of beer on safari in Africa.

The Magic of Hops
Why add hops to your brew?

Hops are the magic flower that makes good beer even better. Hops are grown on vines and the flowers are harvested each fall. Hops add a tang to the beer, as well as taste and aroma. They also act as a natural preservative.

Hops, added at different stages of beer making, give characteristic flavours.

BOILING HOPS - added during the hottest stage of the wort. They impart a tang, or bitterness to the beer as well as imparting a taste and contributing to the longevity of the beer.

FINISHING HOPS - added after the wort has been heated, just prior to drawing off the wort into barrels. The finishing hops add an aroma and taste, according to the type of hop, quantity and quality used.

Hops help cut the sweetness in a beer, delivering a crisp citrus-and-pine kick to the back of your tongue. But the cone-shaped hops flower is more than just a flavor savior. Researchers have shown that it's also a significant source of cholesterol-lowering, cancer-fighting, and virus-killing compounds called polyphenols. What's more, "Just one 12-ounce beer a day decreased fibrinogen, a clotting factor, and increased albumin, which is very important for protein metabolism," says Shela Gorinstein, Ph.D., a researcher at Jerusalem's Hebrew University and the author of a 2007 study on the bioactivity of beer.

Hildegard von Bingen (b. 1098, d.1179) was a Benedictine nun, the Abbess of Diessenberg, and a well known herbalist, mystic and musician who became an advisor to bishops, popes, and kings. She used the curative powers of natural objects for healing, and wrote treatises about natural history and medicinal uses of plants, animals, trees and gemstones. Her writings include the earliest known reference to using hops in beer "(Hops), when put in beer, stops putrification and lends longer durability."

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