Greek Drink History

Wine has also impacted the world in many ways. If wine hadn 't been invented or discovered we would not have vineyard farming today. Wine was a very popular drink during the Roman and Grecian era. In fact wine was the main drink. Greek and Roman men would have get togethers called symposia. The sophisticated, formal, and intellectual atmosphere of the symposion reminded the Greeks of how civilized they were. It reminded that they weren 't just there to drink wine, they were there to discuss many things as well. Wine

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.

As beer started becoming a necessity, it showed the strong need for agriculture in society. People came together, to make an industry of beer, and creating civilizations.

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

1. The discovery of beer is linked to the growth of the first civilizations because in both cultures of Mesopotamia and Egypt, beer was the main drink. It was consumed by everyone and was known as the defining drink of both of the first great civilizations.

2D: Wine was a major part of Greek and Roman culture and trade, and played a significant role in shaping these two empires. In certain religions, medicine plays a big role in shaping them, such as the miracles that Jesus was said to have performed.

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

Wine was a popular drink back in ancient Rome. Many people desired the consumption of wine as it grew to be an important factor in Rome’s trade. Wine allowed Rome to control more territory. Also many new people started writing books on how wine was produced like Cato the Censor, Varro, and Columella. These works provided insight on how wine played a part in Roman culture. Consumption of wine started bringing taxes on the quantity people drank. However, wine was an essential need in everyday life. The trading of wine helped Rome many beneficial ways because it allowed the Romans to get different goods from many places and it also allowed their empire to expand in territory and influence.

In the chapters “A Stone-Age Brew” and “Civilized Beer” from the book A History of the World in 6 Glasses, Tom Standage describes how beer affected the lives of the first humans who lived in year-round settlements and later in the first civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt. Beer played a significant role in turning the first humans from hunter gatherers to farmers. Beer was discovered in the Fertile Crescent around 12,000 years ago, when gruel derived from gathered grains (a staple food) that was in storage fermented. These ancient groups of hunter-gatherers found this beverage “slightly fizzy and pleasantly intoxicating” (Standage 15) and realized it was more easily made than other alcoholic drinks. Over time, the quality and variety of beer increased by trial and error.

As one of the most popular and oldest beverage, tea has shown its splendor whilst making its mark in history. Tea significantly impacted global trade over the past few centuries, spreading from China to specifically, Great Britain. The tea trade had a major social impact among women, who broke away from their domestic lives and explored society to become more socially involved. In addition, tea impacted Britain’s economy by promoting industrialization which was thriving in Britain. Meanwhile, China faced great setbacks as dominance over the tea trade was taken by the British East India Company, having a negative economic impact.

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.

Today tea is known to be the second most consumed beverage in the world and is being drunk by many people daily. Tea is very popular because of its many health benefits such as, protecting your body from ravages of aging, pollution, cancer reduces risk of heart attacks. strokes, protects your bones in your body, boosts your immune defenses,keeps your body hydrated, increases your metabolism and much more. Because of its multiple health benefits, shortly after it was invented, the ancient chinese used tea as a medicine ans sometimes still do to this

The history of wine production traces back thousands of years, with the earliest evidence of a wine-like drink located in China circa and estimated to be of at 7000 BC. Wine was the center of the agricultural culture of many civilizations like the Romans, the Phoenicians and the Greeks, who considered wine a divine drink of the gods. Wine remains until today one of the largest components of the agricultural production in the Western civilization (Appendix 1).

And at the heart of the trade was tea. It came from no other place. India did not then produce any, nor Ceylon, Java, or Formosa; Japan was inaccessible; the world perforce drank China teas. Above all, the English drank them” (17).

China, were the tea came from, was not interested in any trade with western countries. The situation continued to be like that until the Portuguese navigators visited China. The Chinese gradually developed an interest in some of their products, such as firearms, spices and silver. But the British had nothing to offer. China had no interest in English broadcloth, which was useless in the bitterly cold northern China. So the Brits had no choice than spending enormous amounts of silver to purchase their tea leaves. But they couldn’t do that much longer. Since the tea was so expensive, the Brits had no other choice than to start using illegal activities, like smuggling and drugs, to ease the resulting tremendous trade deficit, at least if they wanted to save their countries economy and continue importing their favorite beverage,