Vital Glasses Chapter Summary

1. One of the many acheivments of the arabs was a technique that gave rise to a new range in drinks(distillation). It involved vaporizing and then re-condensing a liquid in order to separate and purify its constituent parts. The Greeks became familiar with this technique, it became dominant. European explorers established colonies and then empires around the world.

There are two reoccurring themes throughout this book. The first theme is how the six drinks (beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and coca-cola) have impacted the world. The second theme is that each drink has some kind of medicinal purpose. Whether the drink did not work as a medicine or it did.

Not only did colonization shape the American identity, but migration within the United States did as well. Religion is a major part of the

There are many things that shape the course of history. Powerful rulers, deadly diseases, and influential religions are a few common examples of these. But, one group of influential commodities to shape history that not many people consider is beverages. In particular, beer, wine, spirits, tea, coffee, and cola are six that have significantly shaped the course of history. The nonfiction book, A History of the World in 6 Glasses, written by Tom Standage, discusses the significance of these six popular drinks in relation to human culture shaping around their existence.

When the Americas were just beginning to form, spirits accelerated their colonialism. At first, sugarcane production was introduced to the Western Indies or Caribbean Islands by Christopher Columbus. The West Indies land was not suitable to grow wine vines or grains for beer, instead Columbus introduced sugar canes to the Indies, creating a major sugar plantation in the West

Beer started out as gruel, and as the gruel fermented it turned into beer. Now it was not the first form of alcohol, but it was an important kind of alcohol. Beer was made from cereal crops, which were very abundant, and because it was so abundant it could be made whenever it was needed. They then found an even easier way to make beer by using beer-bread. Beer bread is basically everything needed to make beer in a loaf, making it convenient to store the raw beer materials. Beer started as just a social drink but then blossomed into a “hallmark of civilization”, as seen by the Mesopotamians. Grain was the basis of the national diet, it was

3. He also provided the foundation not only for a colony but also for major elements in America’s cultural and political development.

Tom Standage’s A History of the World in Six Glasses discusses the importance of six beverages (beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, Coca-Cola), each of which define distinctive periods of civilization. The comparably minor, yet crucial role of water is also represented in support of Standage’s argument regarding not only the necessity of each drink as a requisite to life, but also the role of each drink as a stimulus for cultural diffusion and development. Various historical developments, ranging from water purification to convivia, are utilized to depict each beverage’s appeal and the contributions of each drink towards its respective era of prosperity, subsequently illustrating various historical themes that mark the progression of society

“The obvious conclusion was that beer was a gift from the gods; accidently, many cultures have myths that explain how the gods invented beer and then showed humankind how to make it.” (p19) Egyptians believed that beer was accidently made by Osiris. Osiris being the king of afterlife forgot a mixture of water and grains out in the sun. Later on he found it, decided to drink it yet he

As we read The History of the World in 6 Glasses by Tom Standage, we see the massive impact that certain drinks had on history. These drinks could do everything from controlling trade to influencing government. Their power was endless for one sole reason: demand. All three of these commodities caused major shifts in power. Each of the drinks presented a different type of power. Rum influences the pattern of trade, coffee enhanced the power of intellect, and tea worked with politics to create a in shift power. All three of these powers are important in world history and still have an effect on the world today.

Sugar was introduced by the Arabs to Madeira, the Azores, and the Canaries, which turned out to be great places for cultivating sugar. Slavery developed because slaves were required to work on sugar plantations in these areas. Sugar later became important for creating rum during this period. Rum was used to buy slaves. Slaves produced sugar, which was them made into rum, which bought more slaves, and so on.

During the emerging colony, many things became prominent to the Pilgrims that allowed them to be successful. There were reoccurring themes that seemed to allow growth within the settlement. The Pilgrims had a secure base for a strong banded together community and had religion to put their faith in.

The second chapter of the book called Cuisine and Culture by Linda Civitello, discussed the importance of grain, grapes and olives to Greece and Rome as well as other staple foods of those societies. One of the main discussion points within this chapter, was the history of wine. The book discussed how the Greek god, Dionysus, encouraged drinking wine for men only and how wine changed when the Roman God, Bacchus, took over Dionysus’s role. One interesting discussion the book featured was how Greeks believed “drinking purple wine from a purple vessel made of [amethyst] would cause the two purples to cancel each other out and negate whatever was in the wine that caused drunkenness” (Civitello 32). This theory of being able to drink and not get

Because, the population in Rome grew widely demand for wine increased greatly.The Romans loved their wine so much they drank it with just about every meal. Sense

Eventually beer also had other qualities that allowed farming to progress and that is that beer was not harmful to humans as water was (21). Because of this people found out different ways in which they could produce this drink by having different forms of agriculture advancing its form from regular seeds being planted to massive productions, just as did the Greeks and Romans did by using their slave population to farm all of their grapes for the wine in order to drive a successful wine market (71). Farming allowed for populations to grow from small villages to cities to then allow the adoption of beer and wine to become an essential product that drove agriculture to the civilization and growth of people. Along the same lines we can also see how this development of beer due to farming allowed people to become more than just any regular barbaric man, and show that they were people with class.