Beer and wine in Antiquity: Beneficial remedy or punishment imposed by the Gods?;Pivo i vino u antici - blagotvoran lijek ili božj a kazna?

AMHA - Acta Medico-Historica Adriatica

Volumn 10, Issue 2, 2012, Pages 237-262

  Rosso, Ana María ^a  

^a UNIVERSIDAD DE BUENOS AIRES   (Argentina)

Author keywords

Alcohol abuse; Antiquity; Beer; Remedies; Supernatural properties; Wine

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; BEER; CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY; EGYPT; HISTORY; HUMAN; WINE;

BEER; EGYPT; GREEK WORLD; HISTORY, ANCIENT; HUMANS; WINE;

EID: 84885660201     PISSN: 13344366     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (87)

1. Porphyre, L'antre des Nymphes dans l'Odyssée, XVI, 8.
2. W. Röscher, Nektar und Ambrosia, " Leipzig, 1883 and in Lexicon der Mythologie. In Egypt the water of the Sun's Eye fell to the earth and there was changed into a bee. See also the difference between the food of the Gods and men and their relationship to immortality in A Rosso, "Le regime alimentaire carnée et la société civilisée dans l'Antiquité, " 40th. International Congress of the History of Medicine, Budapest, Hungary, 26-30 August 2006 and "Civilización y barbarie, la alimentación carnívora en la Antigüedad, " 41st. International Congress of the History of Medicine, México-Puebla, 7-12 September 2008.
3. B. Kemp, El antiguo Egipto, Barcelona, Crítica, 1998, p. 282.
4. It is a folk song retained first as oral tradition and its oldest themes could be as old as 3.000 years.
5. "Book of the heavenly cow" in M. Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Litterature, vol. II: the New Kingdom, University of California Press, 1976 p. 197-199.
6. J-C. Goyon, "Hathor, l'ivraie et l'ivresse, " Cercle Lyonnais d'Egyptologie Victor Loret, Bulletin NO 6, Lyon, 1992, p. 7-16, p. 9. The earliest written references indicating to be noxious and toxic weeds may be found in the Gospel of Matthew (13, 36-43) and in authors such as Plautus (The Braggart soldier), Virgil (Georgic I, 125) Ovid (Fasti I, 691-692) and Dioscorides (II, 122).
7. Archaelogical excavations at Hierakonplis have uncovered a Predynastic bakery and brewery situated next to each other. D. Brewer, D. Redford, S. Redford, Domestic plants and animals: The Egyptian Origins, Warminster, England, Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1994, p. 29.
8. This cereal bdt appears initially in Dynasty I, but during the Old and Middle Kingdoms the leading corn was barley, emmer was second and in New Kingdom the relative importance of two grains was reversed and the preeminence of emmer is attested from XXV Dynasty through the Persian Period. D. Dixon, "A Note on Cereals in Ancient Egypt, " in P. Ucko, G. Dimbleby (eds.), The Domestication and Exploitation of Plants and Animals, Chicago, Aldine Publishing Co., 1969, p. 131-142, p. 138.
9. W. Emery, Great Tombs of the First Dinasty II, London,1958.
10. A. Gardiner, Ancient Egyptian Onomastica II, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1947.
11. F. Griffith, "Cataloge of the Demotic Papyri in the John Rylands Library" III, Manchester, John Rylands Library, 1909.
12. B. Abadir, "Dsr(t), the plant and the drink, " Discussions in Egyptology 45, 1999, p. 7-22, p. 7. In page 22 he infers that: "Dsrt is an ale with anise flavor due to its containing anise oil, which turns into a milky appearance when adequate mount of water is available to it. ".
13. See this discussion about the meanings in the book by A. Egbert, In quest of meaning; a study of ancient Egyptian rites of consecrating the meret-chests and driving the calves, Leiden, 1995, p. 142, n 11.
14. G. Lefebvre, Essai sur la médecine Égyptienne de l'époque pharaonique, Vendôme, 1956, p. 106, n 9, 107, 121.
15. R. Cam inos, Late Egyptian Miscelanies, London, Oxford University Press, 1954, p. 425.
16. W. Helck, "Das Bier im alten Ägypten, " in Jahrbuch der Gesellschaft für Geschichte und Bibliographie des Brauwesens, Berlin, Institut für Gärungsgewerbe, 1972, p. 9-120, p. 18 s. and p. 105 n 3, about different expressions of the word.
17. Hecateus and Athanaeus (X, 418e and 447d) quoted also that "the Egyptians grind barley for a beverage. ".
18. B. Kemp, El antiguo Egipto, Barcelona, Crítica, 1998, p. 282.
19. Emmer, a type of wheat (Triticum dicoccum), is a plant of the grass family used principally for its grain as human food and livestock feed.
20. Dried residues of 'beer' jars have provided information about ingredients: various cereals including grains of barley or emmer, yeast cells of a wild especies, molds, bacteria and small proportions of different impurities.
21. B. Kemp, El antiguo Egipto, Barcelona, Crítica, 1998, p. 282.
22. The oldest and more extensive documentation about viticulture and winemaking comes from Egypt and documents and painting related to it comes from walls of Egyptian tombs. See J. Guas h, Wine in Ancient Egypt: a cultural and analytical study, Oxford, British Archaelogical Reports International Series, vol. 1851, oct. 2008.
23. Archaelogical excavations at Hierakonplis have uncovered a Predynastic bakery and brewery situated next to each other. D. Brewer, D. Redford, S. Redford, Domestic plants and animals: The Egyptian Origins, Warminster, England, Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1994, p. 29.
24. H. Kamal, Dictionary of Pharaonic Medicine, Cairo, The National Publication House, 1967, p. 498.
25. Archaelogical excavations at Hierakonplis have uncovered a Predynastic bakery and brewery situated next to each other. D. Brewer, D. Redford, S. Redford, Domestic plants and animals: The Egyptian Origins, Warminster, England, Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1994, p. 29.
26. G. Posener, A Dictionary of Egyptian Civilization, London, Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1962, p. 300.
27. P. Germer, Sekhmet et la protection du monde, Genève, Belles Lettres, 1982, pp. 258-59.
28. W. Harer, "Pharmacological and Biological Properties of the Egyptian Lotus, " JARCE 22, 1985, p. 49-55.
29. Archaelogical excavations at Hierakonplis have uncovered a Predynastic bakery and brewery situated next to each other. D. Brewer, D. Redford, S. Redford, Domestic plants and animals: The Egyptian Origins, Warminster, England, Aris & Phillips Ltd., 1994, p. 29.
30. N. Cherpion, «Le 'cône d'onguent', gage de survie», BIFAO 94, 1994, p.79-106, p. 88-9.
31. A. Rosso, «La maladie sacrée et la santé mentale, des l'Ántiquité à la Renaissance», Proceedings of 36th. International Congress of the History of Medicine, Carthage, Tunis, 6-11 Sept. 1998, Tunis, Société Tunisienne d'Histoire de la Médecine et de la Pharmacie, 2001, p. 427-29.
32. E. Dodds, Los griegos y lo irracional, Madrid, Alianza, 1985.
33. M. Detienne, Dionysos à ciel ouvert, Paris, Hachette, 1986.
34. Athenaeus of Naucratis lived in Egypt and was a Greek rethorician and grammarian flourished between II and III century. He wrote fifteen volumes of a treatise, Deipnosophistae, which means 'dinner-table philosophers' and belongs to the literary tradition inspired by the use of the Greek banquet. He included a meticulous catalogue of the various eating and drinking customs of various peoples and precious little about Greek attitudes towards beer in classical times.
35. The Homeric epithet of wine is aîthops, the name of one of the horses of the Sun. Aithiops rips the god Bacchus'autumn strains and is flowers friend. Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae XI, 465 b; Euripides, Andromache, fr. 896.
36. J.-P. Vernant, "Manger aux pays du Soleil», in M. Detienne, J.-P. Vernant, La cuisine du sacrifice en pays grec, Millau, Gallimard, 2001, p. 239-269, p. 247.
37. The first attestation of this genuinely Greek word applied to the Egyptian product, perhaps the Egyptian Dsrt, is in Theophras tus, History of plants IV, 8, 12.
38. It is quite possible that Thracians and Phrygians shared the worship of Dionysus as Sabazius from an early time, whose rites resembled those for Dionysus, and also identified both. It is tempting to think that worshipers of Sabazius drank beer, but at least under Roman influences Sabazius was worshipped with wine, although in later Roman time at least in Illyria (a region near Thrace) Sabazius was connected to beer (E. Lane, Corpus Cultus Iovis Sabazii II: Conclusions, Leiden, 1989.
39. See Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae X, 447b.
40. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
41. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
42. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
43. S. Kottek, "Selected Elements of Talmudic medical Terminology, with special consideration to Greco-Latin influences and sources, " in Aufstieg und Niedergang der Roemischen Welt (ANRW), Teil II: Principat, Band 37.3, 1996, p. 2912-2932, p. 2928.
44. M. Wellmann, "Zur Geschichte der Medicin im Alterthume" Hermes 35, 1900, p 349-370, p. 361.
45. Departement of Greek and Roman Art. "The symposium in ancient Greece, " in Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000.
46. Iceland epic Edda is also know as the Younger Edda or Snorri's Edda because it was written by the Icelander scholar and historian Snorri Sturlosson around 1220, collecting poetically narrated folktales relating to Norse mytology or Norse heroes.
47. "You shall then prepare from him to drink: figs, 1/8, milk 1/16; notched sycamore fruit 1/8; which have 'spent the night' in sweet beer, 1/10. Strain and drink much so that he get well immediately. " (Ebers 210).
48. J. Nun, Ancient Egyptian medicine, London, British Museum Press, 1996, p. 140.
49. J. Nun, Ancient Egyptian medicine, London, British Museum Press, 1996, p. 140.
50. W. Darby, P. Ghalioungiu, L. Grivette, Food: the gift of Osiris, London, New York, San Francisco, Academic Press, 1977, vol. II, p. 574.
51. A. Rosso, "An example of the influences and transferences of the Ancient Egyptian to Greek medicine; the wxdw theory, " XXth Nordic Medical History Congress, August 10-13 2005, Reyjavík, Iceland, published in an Spanish version, "Un ejemplo de las influencias y transferencias de la medicina egipcia a la griega: la teoría de los wxdw, " C. Viesca, J.-P. Tricot (ed.), Analecta Histórico Médica V, Año V, Mexico, 2007, p. 159-174.
52. S. Kottek, "Selected Elements of Talmudic medical Terminology, with special consideration to Greco-Latin influences and sources, " in Aufstieg und Niedergang der Roemischen Welt (ANRW), Teil II: Principat, Band 37.3, 1996, p. 2912-2932, p. 2928.
53. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
54. Probably tetracycline, because Debra Martin detected the antibiotic tetracycline by serendipity, while examining a thin section of bone from the Roman Period. See G. Armelag os, J. Mills, "Palaeopathology as science: the contribution of Egyptology" in W. Davies, R. Walker (eds.), Biological Antropology and the Study of Ancient Egypt, London, British Museum Press, 1993, p. 1-18.
55. J. Nun, Ancient Egyptian medicine, London, British Museum Press, 1996, p. 140.
56. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
57. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
58. It is an erroneous derivation from the Latin ladanum and the Greek or ladanon.
59. S. Kottek, "Selected Elements of Talmudic medical Terminology, with special consideration to Greco-Latin influences and sources, " in Aufstieg und Niedergang der Roemischen Welt (ANRW), Teil II: Principat, Band 37.3, 1996, p. 2912-2932, p. 2928.
60. On the use of liquid, V.
61. A. Delatte, Le cyceo-n, breuvage ritual des mystères d'Eleusis, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1955.
62. He includes a variety of different fruit production and according to its different kinds he points out many advantages and disavantages.
63. See F. Rosner, La médecine tirée du Misene Torah de Maimonide, Paris, Bibleurope et Britt International, 1992, p. 329.
64. See F. Rosner, La médecine tirée du Misene Torah de Maimonide, Paris, Bibleurope et Britt International, 1992, p. 329.
65. N. and A. El Guebaly, "Alcohol abuse in ancient Egypt. The recorded evidence". The International Journal of the addictions 16 (7), 1982, p. 1207-1221.
66. D. Brewer, E. Teeter, Egypt and the Egyptians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001, chap. 7, "Ancient Egyptian Society and family life. ".
67. N. Ebeid, Egyptian medicine in the days of the Pharaohs, General Egyptian Book organization Press, 1999.
68. H. Lutz, Viticulture and brewing in the Ancient Orient, Leipzig, Heinrich, 1922, p. 85.
69. W. Kristensen, De loofhut en het loofhuttenfeest in dem egyptischen cultus, Amsterdam, 1923, p. 20.
70. A. Rosso, "Les bateaux et le sacré dans l'Ancienne Egypte, " Proceedings of Evolving Egypt: innovation, appropiation and reinterpretation in Ancient Egypt, Brigham Young University-Hawaii, USA, 2012.
71. A. Roberts, Hathor rising, (the serpent power of Ancient Egypt), Wiltshire, Redwood Books, 1995), p. 9.
72. Typhonic or Typhon, from the Greek word thuphon, make reference to the name of the father of the winds and to a common noun meaning 'whirlwing'. It is applied to the totemic animal of the god Seth, a dog-like creature native to desert regions, renowned for its intelligence and its hostility to human beings.
73. It is a strong intoxicating drink deified, made with the Soma Plant, and its exhilarating juice was identified with the Moon who containing the celestial nectar, the drink of gods. The Mon-God poor down his ambrosia rain throught the sieve of heaven, the Soma Juice.
74. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
75. V. Singleton, "An enologist's commentary on Ancient wines" in P. McGovern, S. Fleming, S. Katz(ed.), The origins and ancient history of wine, Luxembourg, Gordon and Breach, 1995, p. 67-77, p 75.
76. T. Unwin, Wine and the vine: an historical geography of viticulture and wine trade, London, Routledge, 1991, p. 179.
77. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
78. M. Nelson, The Barbarian's beverage. A history of beer in ancient Europe, Oxon-New York, Routledge, 2005, p. 16.
79. W. Budge, The Dwellers on the Nile, New York, Bloom, 1926.
80. J. Nun, Ancient Egyptian medicine, London, British Museum Press, 1996, p. 140.
81. A. Volten, Das demotische Weisheitsbuch, Studien und Bearbeitung, Kopenhagen, Einar Munskgaard, 1941, Analecta Aegyptica v. II.
82. F. Jonckheere, "Le monde des malades, " CdE 50, 1950, p. 213-232, p. 224-5.
83. G. Posener, A Dictionary of Egyptian civilization, London, 1962, p. 69.
84. "Story of a mariner, " Great demotic papyus of the Biblothèque Nationale de Paris, Ptolemaic Period, recto 11-12.
85. A. Rosso, "Poppy and opium in ancient times, remedy or narcotic?, " Biomedicine International Vol. I, N° 2, 2010, p. 81-87, p. 87.
86. G. Lefévbre, Le tombeau de Pétosiris, Le Caire, IFAO, 1923, t. I, p. 161 and 60.
87. Sur l'intoxicación divine voir M. Stracma ns, "Osiris-Dyonisos et les chants de harpistes égyptiens, " Louvain, Imprimerie Orientaliste Durbecq, 1946, p. 207-14 and G. Pinch, Votive offerings to Hathor, Oxford, 1993, p. 198 and 245.