Want to brew an ancient Mesopotamian ale

Hi everyone, I'm beginning to write/research an article on homebrewing an ancient Mesopotamian ale (that I have affectionately called "Siduri's Advice"; based on the advice the Babylonian ale-wife Siduri gives to Gilgamesh in the Epic of Gilgamesh to "Fill your belly <with beer>. Day and night make merry"). I will be malting, crushing and using a large amount of my own 2-row barley (the same type as used in ancient Mesopotamia) to make a brewing bread (Bappir) that I will add to the brew (as discussed in the Hymn to Ninsaki) and will be using date syrup rather than sugar for bottling (again the same as the Mesopotamians). I plan, at least initially to make some compromises for practical reasons: 1) using Mr. Beer fermenter rather than a clay fermenter, 2) using Mr. Beer's yeast rather than adding wild yeast found on grapes (although I will crush and add some sterilized grapes to make a more authentic ancient ale) and 3) using the lowest hop HME extract. Number 3 is a big sacrifice on the authenticity front, as the Mesopotamians did not use hops, but without the antimicrobial hops, at least in this first experiment, I am worried the beer will spoil, and I don't know which "aromatic herbs" are being refered to in the Hymn to Ninsaki, so I am fine to start this experiment with hops, but plan to research Gruit ale based spices/herbs that were present in Mesopotamia 5000 years ago in the next batch.

My questions for all you experienced brewers are:

Has anyone here previously tried to re-create an ancient Mesopotamian ale, and if so what was their experience? And does anyone have any other suggestions as to how to make this a more authentic Mesopotamian ale?

This article from the Smithsonian Magazine about Dogfish Head's Midas Touch might provide some insight. This is the only thing close to what you're talking about I've run across.

It sounds like A LOT of work to go through (malting your own grain, make a brewing bread) only to turn around and use a hopped malt extract and Mr. Beer yeast. I would think the yeast would be one of the most important parts to claiming authenticity.

Wouldn't you rather do a small all-grain batch (if using the Mr. Beer fermenter plus you can leave out the hops) and see what kind of wilder or weirder yeasts you can get from the yeast producers?

Just re-read my post. Thought it seemed a little negative. I do think this is a really cool idea!

thesemicullen said:

This article from the Smithsonian Magazine about Dogfish Head's Midas Touch might provide some insight. This is the only thing close to what you're talking about I've run across.

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Great, thanks for the link!

ImNoExpert said:

It sounds like A LOT of work to go through (malting your own grain, make a brewing bread) only to turn around and use a hopped malt extract and Mr. Beer yeast. I would think the yeast would be one of the most important parts to claiming authenticity.

Wouldn't you rather do a small all-grain batch (if using the Mr. Beer fermenter plus you can leave out the hops) and see what kind of wilder or weirder yeasts you can get from the yeast producers?

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You're right, the use of HME in particular didn't feel right. You're not being negative you are just highlighting a weak point (use of hops) from the authenticity front. The reason I wanted to use at least some hops was because I could not understand how a beer with no bittering agent at all could be in any way drinkable. I have been thinking about this a lot yesterday and finally realized that the Hymn to Ninkasi held the clue to how the Mesopotamians made their beer balanced, they used burnt bappir bread. I tested this hypothesis out last night, the experiment is here:
http://sidurisadvice.com/bappir.html
Long story short, it basically works and burnt bread is a great bittering agent! So I will ditch the HME after all and use burnt bappir instead. Regarding the yeast, I was planning on upgrading that to a more authentic yeast in a future brew, and probably starting to include lacto-bacteria too (almost certainly would have played a role in the Mesopotamian's semi-natural fermentations) which all together will hopefully result in an anicent ale that balances sweet, sour and bitter to equal delicious

Keep in mind that the grain used then would likely me malted spelt.

Here is the recipe for "Gilgamash Sumerian Beer" from Drew Beechum's Everything Homebrewing

http://www.netplaces.com/home-brewing/experiments-recipes-from-the-laboratory/gilgamash-sumerian-beer.htm

BeerGrylls said:

Keep in mind that the grain used then would likely me malted spelt.

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I think malted spelt may have come a bit later, although I could be wrong on this one. Most of the research I have done on the analysis of the Hymn to Ninkasi suggests a recipe for an all barley beer. Unmalted barley for the bappir (burnt or not) and malted barley and date syrup(which they called "honey") as a source of fermeantable sugars.

roastquake said:

Here is the recipe for "Gilgamash Sumerian Beer" from Drew Beechum's Everything Homebrewing

http://www.netplaces.com/home-brewing/experiments-recipes-from-the-laboratory/gilgamash-sumerian-beer.htm

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Awesome! Thank you, I appreciate the link.

if you want to make it more shelf stable yet still make it taste unhopped, you can use some aged "lambic" hops. That should give the preservative properties without bittering or flavor

roastquake said:

Here is the recipe for "Gilgamash Sumerian Beer" from Drew Beechum's Everything Homebrewing

http://www.netplaces.com/home-brewing/experiments-recipes-from-the-laboratory/gilgamash-sumerian-beer.htm

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I understand why they suggest serving the beer flat. It is probable that much of the Mesopotamian beers would have been completely flat. However, a careful examination of the Hymn to Ninkasi suggests at least one highly prized Mesopotamian ale was at least mildly carbonated, ref:
http://sidurisadvice.com/carbonation.html

roastquake said:

if you want to make it more shelf stable yet still make it taste unhopped, you can use some aged "lambic" hops. That should give the preservative properties without bittering or flavor

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That's a perfect solution! I will get the bitterness from the burnt bappir, and the preservative qualities of these aged lambic hops without removing the essential taste of what our ancient ancestors drank. Thanks so much! I knew this was the right forum to figure out how to do this

I have only tried one example of this style and it is Dogfish Heads Midas Touch. If you haven't had it, try one. It's the only beer I've ever dumped after one sip.

JimBraum said:

I understand why they suggest serving the beer flat. It is probable that much of the Mesopotamian beers would have been completely flat. However, a careful examination of the Hymn to Ninkasi suggests at least one highly prized Mesopotamian ale was at least mildly carbonated, ref:
http://sidurisadvice.com/carbonation.html

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that could be from the beer being drunk during fermentation, I know some indigenous cultures still do that (Central/South American corn beer)

Edit: oops should have read the link before posting

glick said:

I have only tried one example of this style and it is Dogfish Heads Midas Touch. If you haven't had it, try one. It's the only beer I've ever dumped after one sip.

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Thanks for the tip. I will give one a go, but I suspect that without the bitterness provided by the burnt bappir the result will be a unbalanced sickly sweet beer, would this be close to what you experienced? I guess I am going on faith here that the beer that the Mesopotamians worshiped in the Hymn to Ninkasi was actually balanced and delicious and we just have not managed to recreate it in its true form... I could well be wrong, but it will be fun to find out

roastquake said:

that could be from the beer being drunk during fermentation, I know some indigenous cultures still do that (Central/South American corn beer)

Edit: oops should have read the link before posting

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Actually, I think you are probably right that the beers would likely have been consumed during fermentation. While this would result in a lower alcohol content (thus less alcohol-induced euphoria) it would also have potentially helped keep the beer from spoiling. However, the theory that Mesopotamian beer may have been completely non-alcoholic, which I have previously seen proposed, well, I would suggest that the following passage from the Epic of Gilgamesh suggests otherwise:
"Enkidu ate the food until he was sated,
he drank the beer-seven jugs!-- and became expansive and sang with joy!
He was elated and his face glowed." Ref:
http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/tab2.htm

JimBraum said:

Thanks for the tip. I will give one a go, but I suspect that without the bitterness provided by the burnt bappir the result will be a unbalanced sickly sweet beer, would this be close to what you experienced? I guess I am going on faith here that the beer that the Mesopotamians worshiped in the Hymn to Ninkasi was actually balanced and delicious and we just have not managed to recreate it in its true form... I could well be wrong, but it will be fun to find out

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For not having tried one you've got the flavor pegged!!!

Anchor brewed a Hymn-to-Ninkasi-based beer in 1989; they pulled the page about it from their site at some point, but it's still available on the Way Back Machine:

http://web.archive.org/web/20090222001007/http://www.anchorbrewing.com/beers/ninkasi.htm

Fascinating read, with partial recipe, and a reference to a professor they partnered with to help them figure out to how to brew an authentic-as-possible Sumerian beer.

Probably would've been fermented at a pretty high temp wouldn't it? Depending on what strains of yeast ended up in each batch and the various fermentation temperatures they experienced, I'm guessing that Sumerian beer had quite a bit of variety.

thesemicullen said:

This article from the Smithsonian Magazine about Dogfish Head's Midas Touch might provide some insight. This is the only thing close to what you're talking about I've run across.

Click to expand...

I was going to say, just go buy yourself some dogfish because I am sure they have done it.... Good luck...

feinbera said:

Anchor brewed a Hymn-to-Ninkasi-based beer in 1989; they pulled the page about it from their site at some point, but it's still available on the Way Back Machine:

http://web.archive.org/web/20090222001007/http://www.anchorbrewing.com/beers/ninkasi.htm

Fascinating read, with partial recipe, and a reference to a professor they partnered with to help them figure out to how to brew an authentic-as-possible Sumerian beer.

Click to expand...

Thanks, great link!

mmurphy said:

Probably would've been fermented at a pretty high temp wouldn't it? Depending on what strains of yeast ended up in each batch and the various fermentation temperatures they experienced, I'm guessing that Sumerian beer had quite a bit of variety.

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No doubt they had a lot more variability than we get we modern technology, but the Sumerians seem to taken great efforts to reduce this variability using specilized equipment (for example certain settlements had fermenting vats half burried in the ground, maintaining a temp difference that slowly stirred at a constant rate), and would have kept the brew at a more constrant and lower temperature overall (a good idea in a generally hotter climate, although Mesopotamia then was more temperate than Iraq today). Also, it is likely they reused the same tools from brew to brew therefore likely seeding the same strain of yeast each time, and they standarized recipes in verbal ways, like the Hymn to Ninkasi, which are remarkably similar even when found on different tablets in different areas.

jakenbacon said:

I was going to say, just go buy yourself some dogfish because I am sure they have done it.... Good luck...

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Thanks, I am going to use the current commercial offerings as a jumping off point, but I think with some dedicated research we can get closer to a more authentic brew. I am not sure burnt bappir and lacto-bacteria have been used in the commercial brews to date...

Correct me if I'm wrong,but wasn't it the Mesopotamians that drank the beer from under the grains,etc with long curved straws,as seen in ancient texts & tablets? That's what I saw on history or discovery videos on the subject. Youtube might still have them. And that's the beer as found in King Midas' tomb in Turkey. I wouldn't be entirely sure that that would be anything but his own special preference in beer/ale/wine combination,as muscat grape juice is also used in producing it,among other things. There's a video on the scientist that worked with Sam to develope a recipe for Midas Touch.

unionrdr said:

Correct me if I'm wrong,but wasn't it the Mesopotamians that drank the beer from under the grains,etc with long curved straws,as seen in ancient texts & tablets? That's what I saw on history or discovery videos on the subject. Youtube might still have them. And that's the beer as found in King Midas' tomb in Turkey. I wouldn't be entirely sure that that would be anything but his own special preference in beer/ale/wine combination,as muscat grape juice is also used in producing it,among other things. There's a video on the scientist that worked with Sam to develope a recipe for Midas Touch.

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Yes, the images show the Mesopotamians drinking from long straws directly from the large containers, in fact, the evidence of fitted lids in these images is one of the reasons I propose at least one highly regarded Mesopotamian beer was at least mildly carbonated:
http://sidurisadvice.com/carbonation.html

I saw the Youtube video of Sam from Dogfish developing an ancient Egyptian beer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4nEKjof74E

I really like his use of wild yeast and appropriate herbs and spices. However, one significant change I would like to make would be the usage of burnt bappir. Sam just added the bread without knowing what its purpose might have been, and suggested it might be a coloring agent. My hypothesis is that the Mesopotamians actually burnt the bappir before adding it, thereby providing the much needed bittering agent to balance the malty sweetness of the beer. My own experimental results appear to support this hypothesis:
http://sidurisadvice.com/bappir.html
I also realized that the fact that the Mesopotamians say the bread is "twice baked" may be their way of saying bake it again to burn it. Also, scholars have been wondering why bappir is not included in the lists of Mesopotamian storable food stuffs, and why it ONLY appears to have been as an ingredient for beer. This makes perfect sense if bappir meant burnt bread, as the the bread would not be eatten by itself and would only have been used in beer. It all makes sense! Hopefully adding burnt bappir will result in an ancient Mesopotamian ale worthy of worship

in case i missed it, have you identified the herbs that were/may have been used in brewing? If not, you might want to start with looking at what medicinal herbs were used in the region (Eliminating the items that are obviously bad ideas) at that time and go from there in small batches. Many herbs with medicinal properties have also been commonly used in culinary applications (Sage, for example), and alcohol has frequently been used to administer medication throughout the ages. Maybe the link is in there?

Great Lakes Brewing Company just recently did this exact experiment. I was able to go to the tasting. They worked with the University of Chicago to attempt an authentic recipe using clay pots and wild yeast. Look Here:
http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/great-lakes-brewing-company-brews-sumerian-beer.28754/

It was definitely NOT what I expected! But the experience was definitely memorable and a lot of fun

JimBraum, my experiences might help. I tried to create a historic Egyptian beer and researched the heck out of it. The effort was to create a compromise between modern and old techniques and flavors. One just cannot get the same flavors from a nice, clean Mr. Beer keg as you might from often-used and contaminated clay jars. Nor would you want to! (Yuk)

• A 2.5 gallon batch, just what a Mr.Beer keg can handle
• 3 lb malted two-row
• 2 lb malted Emmer wheat, an early type of cultivated wheat. It was a special small test batch from the local malthouse and the properties were very close to modern wheat malts so you could substitute modern wheat.
• It was bittered with flowers of common yarrow, 2 oz undried (about 1 cup)
• The yeast was a modern Belgian type to simulate the esters you might get from a wild strain, with reduced risk of infection.
• Very low carbonation in the bottle. Ancient beer was probably flat, brewed in non-pressure vessels and carried in open pots to the workers. Our modern tastes expect some carbonation.

The final result tasted odd, mainly because of the yarrow. I am not used to flavors other than hops and yarrow gave it a distinct herbal, green taste.

I tested the bittering power of unknown herbs by brewing teas of various strengths and boil times, then scaled it up to the batch size

The aromatic herbs could be anything. A common spice mix in the middle east is Za'atar, a mix of sumac, thyme, and salt (the salt was not used in beer). They use the word "thyme" to represent any number of green herbs - oregano, rosemary, cilantro, perhaps even thyme. They did have mugwort and yarrow for bittering. Sumac lends a sour flavor, however I think most of those early beers were sour from bacteria inoculation. They also had coriander and other spices - lots of international trade going through that area!

Go for it! Start with the basic malted barley, spelt, wheat, or a combination - all those grains were available. Bitter it with anything except hops, and season it to your taste. There were as many recipes back then as there are now. You won't be wrong.

Skal!

Twice-baked may not be for roasting and darkening. The first baking cause it to rise and fixes the taste. The second baking dries it out for longer term storage. Just like zwieback cookies for teething babies.

Damnit. Accidentally hit the wrong button & erased my original post. Here we go again...Here's on where Sam talks about Midas Touch;
Another for the archeological parameters for the beginings of beer; http://morebeer.com/brewingtechniques/library/backissues/issue2.5/kavanagh.html
And for the original version of Theobroma from DFH-Xocolatl; http://ryanbrews.blogspot.com/2009/09/xocolatl-fermented-food-of-gods.html
And an update; http://ryanbrews.blogspot.com/2009/12/xocolatl-review-revisions.html
The other sites have since been taken down that provided more of the science you needed. I's have to do some more research...

OK,i found one of them with Pat talking about it & showing slides;
There's a couple more coming. I love helping with facinating stuff like this. My wife & I love archeology,& such.

A lil more info on fermented cacao beverages...;

This is the most provacative Alcoholic beverage to prove beer in mesopetamia. Take what you want fom it. [ame="http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b1DsfT4RzA"]http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b1DsfT4RzA[/ame]

I think Dr. Pat McGovern is a genius, and his dedication to resurrecting these recipes is inspiring. I lifted this link out of another linked article in this thread. It's long, but it's a good read. Goes a bit into the za'atar that they used as the flavoring agent, some ingredients of which I've never heard of. Now I really want to go back to the store and buy the Midas Touch I saw on the shelf.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/The-Beer-Archaeologist.html?c=y&story=fullstory

That's the link I couldn't find in my list. Good read on the spice market stuff Sam found over there. Not sure if you can find those over here somewhere??

Thanks everyone for the links and videos! I am still working me way through them, thanks!

Following my first "eureka" moment when I realized that the bappir the Mesopotamians cooked may have been, at least partially, burnt, I performed a simple preliminary taste test using burnt toast and Corona light. The original experiment is here:
http://sidurisadvice.com/bappir.html
Long story short, the burnt toast did indeed seem to improve the taste of Corona light, but this was just a preliminary result and needed to be reproduced with real bappir, a more appropriate test beer and a larger tasting group. I managed to persuade three individuals (Adrian, Joy and Jessica) with varied palates to participate in a blind tasting, and combined with yours truly, we now had a decent sample group to more definitely address the burnt bappir hypothesis, namely, that the Mesopotamians burnt bappir, and it is this burnt element that balances out the sweetness and improves the taste of their beer long before hops were discovered. I have not yet seen this "burnt bappir" hypothesis described anywhere online to date, so I am both excited and a bit concerned. Excited that I may have been the first to put this theory forwards, and a bit concerned that if no-one else previously proposed it, perhaps there was a good reason for the burnt bappir hypothesis not being the case, and I was simply unaware of it. I started doing more reading on bappir to see if further evidence supported or opposed the burnt bappir hypothesis. First of all multiple sources seem to be very specific that bappir was "twice baked". Scholars have previously interpreted this "twice baked" as meaning bake some bread, then bake it again to dry it out so it will be preserved for a long time, presumably as a food stuff? This argument actually doesn't make much sense when we actually look at the lists of foods the Mesopotamians actually stored. According to Peter Damerow in "Sumerian Beer: The Origins of Brewing Technology in Ancient Mesopotamia", ref:
http://sidurisadvice.com/Damerow.html
we learn that bappir was NOT included in the Mesopotamians stored edible foods, suggesting that bappir was not eaten. This makes no sense if bappir was being "twice-baked" to preserve for later eating, as originally proposed, but make perfect sense if "twice-baked" refers to burning bread specifically for beer, not to be eaten. It may even mean the Mesopotamians would use their old leftover barley bread to bake again into burnt bappir, with the burnt bappir providing a much needed bittering agent to balance the sweetness of the malted barley. I collected all of the necessary regents (see Figure 1A); note that Figures are online at:
http://sidurisadvice.com/midas.html
Specifically, reagents I would need to perform this expanded second experiment included a four-pack of Midas Touch (the closest commercially produced beer to the no-hops Mesopotamian original we seek), some organic 2-row barley, some organic cinnamon (to provide the "sweet aromatics" referred to in the hymn, and also historically appropriate) and a mortar and pestle (which I had to buy for this experiment as I have never had the need to crush my own barley seeds before)

I toasted 1 cup of barley seeds for 15 min at 400C in the oven to make them easier to crush (Figure 1B), then I crushed the seeds in the mortar and sieved out about 1/2 cup of barley flour from 1 cup of barley seeds. Next, I mixed this half cup of barley flour with 2 oz of water and a HUGE quantity of cinnamon, probably just over two tablespoons. I really wanted to incorporate a "sweet aromatic" and cinnamon was both used by the Mesopotamians and has a very sweet aroma, probably one of the sweetest aroma spices, thus it is an obvious choice. I then split the barley paste into two biscuit shapes and baked for 400C for 1 hour, and then (when impatience got the better of me as the bappir cakes were still not looking burnt) and whacked the oven up to 550C until it started to smoke (which took less than 10 minutes) and then removed the resulting slightly burnt bappir (Figure 1D). Next, I crushed the bappir and noted that not all of the bappir had burnt, especially not the stuff in the middle of the cake, so I mixed one of the biscuits with a small amount of water and then crumbled over aluminum foil (to maximize the exposed surface area) and then broilled (oven grilled) it on high. The bappir went completely black, but I felt it could be more burnt. The bappir started to slightly smoke, just a hint of it, but I felt it could be more burnt. The bappir started to smoke like crazy, I hesitated for just a moment, could it be more burnt? Unfortunately I had hesitated for a moment too long, the bappir caught on fire! Time froze for a moment as I stared at the burning barley crumbs in my oven, had I let my quest to taste an authentic ancient ale go too far? No, I think not! A small oven fire is a small price to pay to get one step closer to tasting the beer of our ancestors, the ancient ale that inspired those roaming hunter gathers to settle down, farm barley and make beer, the beer that was worshiped as a god, THAT is the beer I want to taste and I will not rest until the original amber nectar of the gods has passed my lips. One small oven fire will not stop me... I smothered the burnt bappir with kitchen towels to put out the fire and after apologizing profusely to the patient taste testers in the living room for filling the house with Barley smoke, and promising to replace the damaged kitchen towels, I ploughed on... for science.

The bappir was perfect, it could NOT get any more burnt without catching fire again, so I decided that now was the time to mash it up with 1/2 a cup of water, microwave it for 45 seconds, stir it, let it still and infuse its flavors into the water for a few minutes, sieve it into a new cup and then put the result in the fridge to cool in time for the upcoming taste test. For each taste test I asked the tasters to drink the beer blinded, then to comment and score the result out of 10. I included some control beers to calibrate the scale of each participant before moving on to the real bappir-test.

Taste test results.

The first "mystery" beer was Corona light, a control beer to see who likes this sort of watery mild beer.
I commented that it was "very mild" and gave it a 4/10.
Adrian said it was "fruity and light" and gave it a 6/10.
Joy said it was "flat, but nice light flavor" and gave it a 7/10.
Finally, Jessica nailed the beer with her comment that it was "like Corona" and gave it a 7.5/10.
So, it looks like everyone prefers Corona light to me... oh well... I don't mind having esoteric taste

The second "mystery beer" was Sierra Nevada pale ale, a very drinkable beer that I often turn to.
I commented that it was a "solid drinkable beer" and gave it 6/10 (a high score for super critical me).
Adrian said it was "fruity and IPA-like" and gave it 7.5/10.
Joy said it "tastes like my fav hoppy beer; sweet, light and fizzy" and gave it 10/10!
Finally Jessica nailed it again saying it was "like Sierra Nevada" and gave it a 8/10.
So, I am definitely the most critical in this group.

The third "mystery beer" was Midas Touch. Let's see how the main commercially available ancient ale stacks up to this tasting group with WITHOUT the burnt bappir...
I felt that it was "unbalanced and too malty and sweet" and gave it a 4/10.
Adrian said it was "sweet" and gave it a 3.5/10.
Joy it had an "unpleasant aftertaste, flat and tastes like an old Coors light, but it has potential" and gave it a 3/10.
Finally, Jessica was entirely unimpressed and called it a "honey water banana bog" and gave it 3/10.
So, across the board it looks like everyone felt that Midas Touch is an unbalanced overly sweet beer; a perfect situation to test the burnt bappir hypothesis! I was excited

The final "mystery beer" was Midas Touch that had had a tablespoon of the bappir water extract mixed in...
I felt that the bappir was definitely taking this beer in the right direction and commented that I "liked the cinnamon note" and gave the beer a 5.5/10, my second highest score of the night, only half a point below Sierra Nevada, which is one of my favorite beers. However, I felt even with the bappir their was still a missing element stopping this beer from achieving true greatness. Possibly what this type of ancient ale needs to take it to a "divine" taste, a beer worthy of worship, is the sourness from the natural lacto-bacteria, this sweet and sour beer might be exactly what is needed for "Siduri's Advice" ancient ale. I will need to look into how to carefully supplement with lactobacillus in order to get the perfect amount of sourness.
Adrian commented it was like "cake in a beer" and gave it 8/10, a huge increase from his previous 3.5 for Midas Touch without bappir.
Joy commented it was "fizzy with very nice flavors" and increased her score from the original 3 to a 6/10, another huge increase.
Finally, Jessica somewhat cryptically commented "bitter bog boasts better beauty", and while I am not entirely sure what that means, she nevertheless increased her score from a 3 to a 4.5/10, so she too liked the bappir addition.
So, across the board, it looks like everyone much preferred the Midas Touch when it included burnt bappir with the sweet aromatic (cinnamon).

In conclusion, this second experiment supports the hypothesis that burnt bappir can improve the flavor of unbalanced sweet ale, such as Midas Touch, and supports the hypothesis that Mesopotamians added burnt bappir to their beer in order to balance and improve the flavor. However, I have come to realize that even with burnt bappir the beer is still missing something, and I think that missing element is a balancing sourness from the lacto-bateria that would almost certainly be a part of a semi-natural fermentation. I will need to take this quest for the ultimate ancient Mesopotamian ale to the next level and actually start my own ancient ales brewing...

Hmm, I've been drinking a bit so I could be completely off base. But, isn't the closest thing to the wild brewing process in modern day actually a German lambic? I mean in terms of the probably biological components. If you assume a fermenting yeast, lacto, and brett then you probably wouldn't have something that was particularly sweet. Brett tends to consume long chain sugars after all. The hymn of Nikasi makes me wonder a bit about that too. Some of the funky aroma's produced by brett could be described as "wet dog".

Interesting project. I will be following this thread.

This experiment reminds me of a story a college professor told in my Middle English Lit class several years ago, about an Old English professor of his antagonizing his conservative Christian, "drinking is a sin" beliefs by pressuring him to drink homebrewed mead brewed with a recipe from the Dark Ages.

I'm far from certain that you'll end up with a decent beer, but I'm loving this ancient history/literature nerd brewing project. The nerd comment is meant in a good way.

I remember reading about early German beers during the Roman conquests. They used,as the egyptians did at one point,partly baked barley loaves that were added to water & heated with hot stones. The egyptians pressed the cakes into water in jars. but the partly baked loaves were fermented into beer. I remember the wine drinking Romans describing it as "pig swallow". So it sounds to me like the loaves were only partly baked to use the leavening agent to ferment the wort.
I'm not sure what to think of all that,since it's now believed that beer pre-dated bread by some 3,000 years?...