Who said archaeology is boring?

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Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2007 11:24 pm

Archaeologists in Ireland have come up with a theory to explain an Irish curiousity. Horseshoe shaped mounds that date back to roughly 2500 BC.

Quote:

How Bronze Age man enjoyed his pint

Declan Moore and Billy Quinn believe Bronze Age Irish men liked a beer
Declan Moore and Billy Quinn have an ancient beer theory
Bronze Age Irishmen were as fond of their beer as their 21st century counterparts, it has been claimed.

Two archaeologists have put forward a theory that one of the most common ancient monuments seen around Ireland may have been used for brewing ale.

Fulacht fiadh - horseshoe shaped grass covered mounds - are conventionally thought of as ancient cooking spots.

But the archaeologists from Galway believe they could have been the country's earliest breweries.

To prove their theory that an extensive brewing tradition existed in Ireland as far back as 2500BC, Billy Quinn and Declan Moore recreated the process.

After just three hours of hard work - and three days of patiently waiting for their brew to ferment - the men enjoyed a pint with a taste of history attached.

Three hundred litres of water were transformed into a "very palatable" 110 litres of frothy ale.

Pint
The archaeologists are producing their fourth batch of beer

"It tasted really good," said Mr Quinn, of Moore Archaeological and Environmental Services (Moore Group).

"We were very surprised. Even a professional brewer we had working with us compared it favourably to his own.

"It tasted like a traditional ale, but was sweeter because there were no hops in it."

Mr Quinn said it was while nursing a hangover one morning - and discussing the natural predisposition of all men to seek means to alter their minds - that he came to the startling conclusion that fulachts could have been the country's earliest breweries.

The two archaeologists set out to investigate their theory in a journey which took them across Europe in search of further evidence. On their return, they used an old wooden trough filled with water and added heated stones.

After achieving an optimum temperature of 60-70�C they began to add milled barley and approximately 45 minutes later simply baled the final product into fermentation vessels.

The men have since made two more batches of beer - the second was stronger and the third was "a disaster" - but they have started work on batch number four which the hope will taste as good as their first.

The archaeologists' experiment is described in detail in next month's edition of the magazine, Archaeology Ireland.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6941951.stm

Where can I get my hands on some of that booze? Obviously it would be for research purposes.

Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2007 11:28 pm

^^^^ My bet is that in their next report, they'll say the ancients learned how to do the brewing from aliens.

You know, the same aliens that built Stonehenge as a landing base ... Confused

Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 12:34 pm

I have 2 things to say:

I have a degree in archaeology.
I share a surname with one of those two chaps.

So how come I've never got a job like that!??

@KD - now, now, don't be silly - the knowledge was passed on to them from survivors of Atlantis! Laughing

Not quite a Newb Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 34

In some higher ancient civilizations bread was not used, because making it would had been an waste of perfectly good raw materials.

Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 1:03 pm

Brewing beer was originally a way to make water drinkable. In the far East they thought tea-leaves purified it (although we now know it was actually the boiling). That's why Westerners can hold alcohol better than Easterners. Millennia of genetics have just made us this way and them that way. And the obverse is why the Far East still drinks a lot of tea.

So I read anyway!

B-S

Posted: Thu Aug 16, 2007 7:34 am

Descartes should have said

Quote:

I brew, therefore I am

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

You've got to wonder how brewing was first discovered

Bread making gone wrong?

See some eejit has thought Skara Brae was a great place to add graffitti toBBC

Now I know Maeshowe has graffiti but its Viking runes not magic marker

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2007 1:41 am

Maybe it was the other way around. Bread was discovered from brewing that went badly wrong.

Graffitti is a funny thing. No doubt when the priests found this bit of graffitti they thought 'Damn those bloody Vikings'.

So the value of the graffitti is entirely dependent on when it was done. In a castle not far from me someone left they name and the date they visited the castle. As it was well over 130 years ago, it's become an acceptable part of the castle. I saw some ancient graffitti in Didyma and Ephesus amongst other places. Now we look at it from the what can this tell us angle. But the magic marker does really suck.

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

Ahhh they're rune ing the walls!

Not sure what that lot says but the Maeshowe one were translated
See link

From what I've heard the police in Orkney have a very good idea of who did the graffiti at Skara Brae and are waiting at the car ferry now! They're not so hopeful about getting the Maeshowe vandals though.

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