Beer History Sites - Page 10

**Revvy** · 01-26-2012, 02:51 PM

binkman has a link to the Syllabus for his "Archeology of Beer" course that he taught at John's Hopkins. It's got some interesting sources. Syllabus

Quote:

Originally Posted by binkman

Here are the slides. I converted them all to PDFs for the sake of compatibility. I made the original files on a mac and apparently mac and pc power point files don't cross-over very well. The PDFs should chew up less RAM anyway.

Lecture 1 - Introduction to Archaeology and Beer
Lecture 2 - The Psychological, Physiological, and Sociological effects of Alcohol
Lecture 3 - The Multidisciplinary Search for Ancient Beer
Lecture 4 - Beer in Ancient Mesopotamia
Lecture 5 - Beer in Ancient Egypt
Lecture 6 - Beer in Pre-Columbian Americas

The course focused first on defining beer in relation to other fermented beverages, then demonstrating what sorts of roles alcohol consumption and production plays in our society and other societies. Then a case by case study of brewing and consumption in three different parts of the ancient world: Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Americas.

Because the course was only three weeks long and I was jamming a LOT of information in there, a lot is left out, too. Also, the final class revolved around the relationship between beer and civilization. There were no slides for that class, it was a kind of end of the course discussion section for people to react to all this information.

**Gear101** · 01-27-2012, 11:39 AM

need to start reading all of these.. nice post

**Airborneguy** · 02-01-2012, 12:08 AM

Been reading a lot, but most of my assignments are academic journals which can only be accessed via the university library.

Here's tonight's readings:

Microscopy Investigation of Egyptian Brewing and Baking Methods:
http://ancientgrains.org/samuel1996science.pdf

Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet II:
http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/tab2.htm

**Revvy** · 02-07-2012, 05:43 PM

I don't have much Canadian stuff on here, but these are cool.

Quote:

Originally Posted by emdiar

My sweetie forwarded me links to some collections of vintage Canadian beer labels on Flickr. I thought these might be of interest here.

Quebec and Northern Ontario

Ontario

Oldest items in the collection

Enjoy!

**Piratwolf** · 02-07-2012, 06:11 PM

FWIW, I'm working on a Master's in History and taking a class on Maritime History. I was reading about ship design in the Netherlands in the 15th century and came across a very interesting section about gruit beer, hopped beer, taxation, and other stuff. Don't have any e-resource for it, but it's the last chapter in...

Unger, Richard W. Ships and Shipping in the North Sea and Atlantic, 1400-1800. Brookfield, VT.: Ashgate Publishing Company, 1997.

The_Professor · 02-08-2012, 12:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Airborneguy

...Microscopy Investigation of Egyptian Brewing and Baking Methods:
http://ancientgrains.org/samuel1996science.pdf...

I've seen this one before and it seems to have some good info.

But I don't understand what the author means by:
...ancient Egyptians brewed using a two-part process of coarsely ground, well heated malt or grain and unheated malt...The process does not resemble modern brewing...

Is mashing or boiling meant by "heated"?
Maybe one set of malt was mashed/boiled and then poured through a second set of malt?

**Airborneguy** · 02-08-2012, 12:35 AM

In other readings, it seems like it is generally agreed that the Egyptians created a half-baked loaf, then wet it and mixed it with fresh grains when it was time to brew. Maybe this is what he was getting at or he misinterpreted some of the research?

The_Professor · 02-08-2012, 12:43 AM

I have seen a lot that suggest the bread thing but a few that say that is a misunderstanding of the original sources. Like some suggest spelt rather than emmer.

**Airborneguy** · 02-08-2012, 12:49 AM

I'm actually reading about Greco-Roman brewing right now (prof. sent me a PDF, can't post it).

According to this source, emmer was #1 for the Greeks and Romans followed by millet then eikhorn. This author believes that barley beer was considered inferior to wheat beer to ancient Greeks at least.

The_Professor · 02-08-2012, 01:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Airborneguy

...emmer was #1 for the Greeks and Romans...

I believe there was a period of time that the Roman army marched on emmer.