History of the world in six glasses

History Of the World in Six Glasses

Beer is one of the most widely spread alcoholic beverage in the history of the human kind. It appears that bear, more than any alcoholic drink known to man has accompanied the evolution of human societies even from the Neolithic era. Tom Standage dedicates the first two chapters of his book a History of the World in Six Glasses to the origins of beer.

Standage points out that due of its ancient history the origins of beer are deeply concealed in the beginnings of the human history, probably as far as the Stone Age. Pictograms from around 4000 BCE show people sharing a drinking, probably beer, through straws from a hug jar made of clay (the History of the World in Six Glasses, p.11). The author emphasizes that beer is a beverage that was discovered, not invented. The fermentation of wild grains of wheat and barley must have occurred through the water that must have infiltrated accidentally in the recipients people used to store them in. The production and consumption of beer is thus closely linked to the first usage of grains by the human societies of hunter-gatherers. Beer followed humanity through its natural evolution from hunter-gatherers into settled communities of farmers. As Tom Standage observed, the main source of nourishment for the first people to settle was the cereal grain people consumed both in solid and liquid forms. Thus, beer, as a beverage that was easier to prepare and keep from spoiling, kept humanity company longer before wine came into consumption on larger scales. It survived though tens of thousands of years and through technological advances in its production and the improvement of its composition, it became the beverage known world wide today and consumed everywhere in the world.

In Bavaria, beer is still considered "nourishment" and it is not unusual that at ten in the morning, during their break, workers in a factory get beer as well as something to eat.

The first written records testifying the making and consumption of beer are coming from the Mesopotamians, closely followed by the Egyptians. The evolution of human societies from hunter-gatherers into farmers and the fertile lands the Sumerians as well as the Egyptians were able to settle on and exploit in their farming activities had led to the surplus in the production of gains and thus to the birth of new social classes: the artisans, the tax collectors, who were usually the temple priests etc. The natural sequence in the development of their societies consisted in the written records they needed to keep in order for the tax payers to be able to prove that they have paid their taxes. The first tax receipts are therefore the first written testimonies for the development of human society and also for the existence and use of the alcoholic beverage that is beer.

The Mesopotamians and the Egyptians considered beer as essential as food in their diet and used it on large scales. Because of its ancient origins and the intoxicating effects in had on the consumers, beer was also held as having mythical powers and thus used in religious rituals. Further more, beer was also less likely to be a contaminated drink since the production process required boiled water. Beer was for the ancient Mesopotamians as well as for the Egyptians nourishment, religious item and even medicinal ingredient.

During ancient times, the preparation process was primitive and the two improvements were those related to the filtering and the addition of different spices and fruits in order to improve its taste. People were paid in beer as well as in food, they gathered to drink beer from the same recipients and thus share not only the liquid in them, but create a sense of communal interaction. Because of its wide spread use, its relatively low cost of production and the unpretentious conditions of storage, beer was the most popular alcoholic drink in ancient times as well as the most used alcoholic beverage at any gathering.

The agricultural surplus led to the development of human societies furthermore and allowed social classes to form while those who were no longer able to get their daily bread and beer by farming the lands could used their working power for the building of cities. The first piece of literature that has endured over the years, the Epic of Gilgamesh, also testifies about the existence and consumption of beer, even attributing it the power to signify the civilization as opposed to the world of the beast that did not have any use of such drink. One of the heroes in the legend, Enkidu, is brought into the civilized world though the contact with a woman, consumption of beer and hygiene: "Enkidu's primitive nature is demonstrated by his lack of familiarity with bread and beer; but once he has consumed them, and then washed himself, he too becomes a human and is then ready to go to Uruk, the city ruled by Gilgamesh" (the History of the World in Six Glasses, p.27). The first recorded literary piece is linked with the largest city in Mesopotamia and the first alcoholic beverage to be used by humans at a large scale.

In ancient times, beer is also known to have been produces and used in various forms, but also in the Americas and in Asia. The ancient Mayas, the Incas and respectively by Tibetans. Later, the ancient Germans started to brew beer in order to use it for religious purposes, but also to drink it at their tables and gatherings. "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"(a History of Beer, http://www.alabev.com/history.htm)

The first major technological improvements in the production process of beer belonged, as many other improvements in the production of alcoholic beverages, to the Christian monks in Europe. After attempts to find a new ingredient that would keep beer from spoiling for longer periods of time, one of the most important ingredients to be used for the preservation of beer became the hops and it was used in Flanders. After that, the Germans were those who left their definitive mark on the production process of beer, by setting the standards to be kept in order for a beverage to be approved as beer. If first beer entered into history though the first depictions of Mesopotamians drinking together though straws from a huge clay pot, then into literature through Enkidu, the civilized hero in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the third stage in its recorded history was its entering into legislation: the law called the Reinheitsgebot issued by the Germans at the beginning of the sixteenth century marked the German hegemony in the world of this popular and ancient alcoholic beverage.