Wine related articles
ALCOHOL IN THE WESTERN WORLD: A HISTORY
[The following article appeared in the June 1998 issue of Scientific
American. Written by Bert L. Vallee, M.D., a Distinguished Senior
Professor at M.I.T., it is a fascinating historical look at the role
alcohol has played. It contains many surprises and puts current thinking
about alcohol into an historical perspective. I have taken the liberty
of editing this article slightly.]
Substances, like people, may have contradictory aspects to their
personality. Today, ethyl alcohol is a multifaceted entity; it may be
social lubricant, sophisticated dining companion, cardiovascular health
benefactor, or agent of destruction. Throughout most of Western
civilization’s history, however, alcohol had a far different role. For
most of the past 10 millennia, alcoholic beverages may have been the
most popular and common daily drink, an indispensable source of fluids
and calories. In a world of contaminated and dangerous water supplies,
alcohol truly earned the title granted it in the Middle Ages: aqua
vitae, the “water of life.”
The earlier societal relationship with alcohol is simply unimaginable
today. Consider this 1777 statement by Prussia’s Frederick the Great,
whose economic strategy was threatened by the importation of coffee: “It
is disgusting to notice the increase in the quantity of coffee used by
my subjects, and the amount of money that goes out of the country as a
consequence. Everybody is using coffee; this must be prevented. His
Majesty was brought up on beer, and so were both his ancestors and
officers. Many battles have been fought and won by soldiers nourished on
beer, and the King does not believe that coffee-drinking soldiers can be
relied upon to endure hardships in case of another war.”
Surely a modern leader who urged alcohol consumption over coffee,
especially in the military, would have his or her mental competence
questioned. But only an eyeblink ago in historical time, a powerful head
of government could describe beer in terms that make it sound like
mother’s milk. Indeed, that nurturing role may be the one alcohol played
from the infancy of the West to the advent of safe water supplies for
the masses only within the past century.
Natural processes have no doubt produced foodstuffs containing
alcohol for millions of years. Yeast, in metabolizing sugar to obtain
energy, creates ethyl alcohol as a by-product of its efforts.
Occasionally animals accidentally consume alcohol that came into being
as fruit “spoiled” in the natural process of fermentation; inebriated
birds and mammals have been reported. Humans have a gene for the enzyme
alcohol dehydrogenase; the presence of this gene at least forces the
conjecture that over evolutionary time animals have encountered alcohol
enough to have evolved a way to metabolize it. Ingestion of alcohol,
however, was unintentional or haphazard until some 10,000 years ago.
About that time, some Late Stone Age gourmand probably tasted the
contents of a jar of honey that had been left unattended longer than
usual. Natural fermentation had been given the opportunity to occur, and
the taster, finding the effects of mild alcohol ingestion provocative,
probably replicated the natural experiment. Comrades and students of
this first oenologist then codified the method for creating such mead or
wines from honey or dates or sap. The technique was fairly simple: leave
the sweet substance alone to ferment.
Beer, which relies on large amounts of starchy grain, had to wait
until the development of agriculture. The fertile river deltas of Egypt
and Mesopotamia (today’s Iraq) produced huge crops of wheat and barley;
the diets of peasants, laborers, and soldiers of these ancient
civilization were cereal-based. It might be viewed as an historical
inevitability that fermented grain would be discovered. As in the
instance of wine, natural experiments probably produced alcoholic
substances that excited those who sampled the results. Before the third
millennium B.C., Egyptians and Babylonians were drinking beers made from
barley and wheat.
Wine, too, would get a boost from agriculture. Most fruit juice, even
wild grape juice, is naturally too low in sugar to produce wine, but the
selection for sweeter grapes leading to the domestication of particular
grape stock eventually led to viniculture. The practice of growing grape
strains suitable for wine production has been credited to people living
in what is now Armenia, at about 6000 B.C., although such dating is
educated guesswork at best.
The creation of agriculture led to food surpluses, which in turn led
to ever larger groups of people living in close quarters, in villages or
cities. These municipalities faced a problem that still vexes, namely
how to provide inhabitants with enough clean, pure water to sustain
their constant need for physiological hydration. The solution, until the
19th century, was nonexistent. The water supply of any group of people
rapidly became polluted with their waste products and thereby dangerous,
even fatal, to drink. How many of our progenitors died attempting to
quench their thirst with water can never be known. Based on current
worldwide crises of dysentery and infectious disease wrought by unclean
water supplies, a safe bet is that a remarkably large portion of our
ancestry succumbed to tainted water.
In addition, the lack of liquids safe for human consumption played a
part in preventing long-range ocean voyages until relatively recently.
Christopher Columbus made his voyage with wine on board, and the
Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock only because their beer stores had run
out. An early order of business was luring brewmasters to the colonies.
Alcohol versus Water
Evidence arguing against a widespread use of water for drinking can
be found in the Bible and ancient Greek texts. Both the Old and New
Testaments are virtually devoid of references to water as a common
beverage. Likewise, Greek writings make scant reference to water
drinking, with the exception of positive statements regarding the
quality of water from mountain springs. Hippocrates specifically cited
water from springs and deep wells as safe, as was rainwater collected in
cisterns. The ancients, through what must have been tragic experience,
clearly understood that most of their water supply was unfit for human
consumption.
In the context of contaminated water supply, ethyl alcohol may indeed
have been mother’s milk to a nascent Western civilization. Beer and wine
were free of pathogens. And the antiseptic power of alcohol, as well as
the natural acidity of wine and beer, killed many pathogens when the
alcoholic drinks were diluted with the sullied water supply. Dating from
the taming and conscious application of the fermentation process, people
of all ages in the West have therefore consumed beer and wine, not
water, as their major daily thirst quenchers.
Babylonian clay tablets more than 6000 years old give beer recipes,
complete with illustrations. The Greek term akratidzomai which came to
mean “to breakfast,” literally translates as “to drink undiluted wine.”
Breakfast apparently could include wine as a bread dip, and “bread and
beer” connoted basic necessity much as does today’s expression “bread
and butter.”
The experience in the East differed greatly. For at least the past
2000 years, the practice of boiling water, usually for tea, has created
a potable supply of nonalcoholic beverages. In addition, genetics played
an important role in making Asia avoid alcohol: approximately half of
all Asian people lack an enzyme necessary for complete alcohol
metabolism, making the experience of drinking quite unpleasant. Thus,
beer and wine took their place as staples only in Western societies and
remained there until the end of the last century.
The traditional production of beer and wine by fermentation of
cereals and grapes or other fruits produced beverages with low alcohol
content compared with those familiar to present-day consumers. The
beverages also contained large amounts of acetic acid and other organic
acids created during fermentation. Most wines of ancient times probably
would turn a modern oenophile’s nose; these old-style wines in new
bottles would more closely resemble today’s vinegar with some hints of
cider, than a prizewinning Merlot.
As the alcohol content of daily staple drinks was low, consumers
focused on issues of taste, thirst quenching, hunger satisfaction and
storage rather than on intoxication. Nevertheless, the “side effects” of
this constant, low-level intake must have been almost universal. Indeed,
throughout Western history the normal state of mind may have been one of
mild inebriation.
The caloric value of nonperishable alcoholic beverages may also have
played a significant role in meeting the daily energy requirements of
societies that might have faced food shortages. In addition, they
provided essential micro nutrients, such as vitamins and minerals.
Alcohol also served to distract from the fatigue and boredom of daily
life in most cultures, while alleviating pain for which remedies were
nonexistent. Today we have a plethora of handy choices against common
aches and pain. But until this century, the only analgesic generally
available in the West was alcohol. From the Book of Proverbs comes this
prescription: “Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and
wine unto them that be of heavy hearts. Let him drink, and forget his
poverty, and remember his misery no more.” A Sumerian cuneiform tablet
of pharmacopoeia dated to about 2100 B.C. is generally cited as the
oldest preserved record of medicinal alcohol, although Egyptian papyri
may have preceded the tablet. Hippocrates’ therapeutic system featured
wines as remedies for almost all known acute or chronic ailments, and
the Alexandria School of Medicine supported the medical use of alcohol.
Religion and Moderation
The beverages of ancient societies may have been far lower in alcohol
than their current versions, but people of the time were aware of the
potentially deleterious behavioral effects of drinking. The call for
temperance began quite early in Hebrew, Greek and Roman cultures and was
reiterated throughout history. The Old Testament frequently disapproves
of drunkenness, and the prophet Ezra and his successors integrated wine
into everyday Hebrew ritual, perhaps partly to moderate undisciplined
drinking, thus creating a religiously inspired and controlled form of
prohibition.
In the New Testament, Jesus obviously sanctioned alcohol consumption,
resorting to miracle in the transformation of water to wine, an act that
may acknowledge the goodness of alcohol versus the polluted nature of
water. His followers extended measures to balance the use and abuse of
wine, but never supported total prohibition. Saint Paul and other
fathers of early Christianity carried on such moderating attitudes.
Rather than castigating wine for its effects on sobriety, they
considered it a gift from God, both for its medicinal qualities and the
tranquilizing characteristics that offered relief from pain and the
anxiety of daily life.
Traditionally, beer has been the drink of the common folk, whereas
wine was reserved for the more affluent. Grape wine, however, became
available to the average Roman after a century of vineyard expansion
that ended in a about 30 B.C., a boom driven by greater profits for wine
grapes compared with grain. Ultimately, the increased supply drove
prices down, and the common Roman could partake in wine that was
virtually free. Roman viniculture declined with the empire and was
inherited by the Catholic Church and its monasteries, the only
institutions with sufficient resources to maintain production.
For nearly 1300 years the Church operated the biggest and best
vineyards, to considerable profit. Throughout the Middle Ages, grain
remained the basic food of peasants and beer their normal beverage,
along with mead and home made wines or ciders. The few critics of
alcohol consumption were stymied by the continuing simple fact of the
lack of safe alternatives. Hence, despite transitions in political
systems, religions and ways of life, the West’s use of and opinion
toward beer and wine remained remarkably unchanged. But a technological
development would alter the relationship between alcohol and humanity.
After perhaps 9000 years of experience drinking relatively low
alcohol mead, beer and wine, the west was faced with alcohol in a highly
concentrated form, thanks to distillation. Developed in about A.D.
700-750 (http://www.gabarin.com/ayh/alcohol.htm#_ednref23)
by Arab alchemists (for whom "al kohl" signified any material’s basic
essence), distillation brought about the first significant change in the
mode and magnitude of human alcohol consumption since the beginning of
Western civilization. Although yeasts produce alcohol, they can tolerate
concentrations of only about 16 percent. Fermented beverages therefore
had a natural maximum proof. Distillation circumvents nature’s limit by
taking advantage of alcohol’s 78 degree Celsius (172 degrees Fahrenheit)
boiling point, compared with 100 degrees C for water (212 degrees F).
Boiling a water-alcohol mixture puts more of the mix’s volatile alcohol
than its water in the vapor. Condensing the vapor yields liquid with a
much higher alcohol level than that of the starting liquid.
The Arab method - the custom of abstinence had not yet been adopted
by Islam - spread to Europe, and distillation of wine to produce spirits
commenced on the Continent in about A.D. 1100. The venue was the medical
school at Salerno, Italy, an important center for the transfer of
medical and chemical theory and methods from Asia Minor to the West.
Joining the traditional alcoholic drinks of beer and wine, which had low
alcohol concentration and positive nutritional benefit, were beverages
with sufficient alcohol levels to cause the widespread problems still
with us today. The era of distilled spirits had begun.
Knowledge of distillation gradually spread from Arabia to Italy to
northern Europe. Alsatian physician Hieronymus Brunschwig described the
process in 1500 in Liber de arte distillandi, the first printed
book on distillation. Distilled alcohol had already earned its split
personality as nourishing food, beneficent medicine, and harmful drug.
The widespread drinking of spirits followed closely on the heels of the
14th century’s bouts with plague, notably the Black Death of 1347-1351.
Though completely ineffective as a cure for plague, alcohol did make the
victim who drank it at least feel more robust. No other known agent
could accomplish even that much. The medieval physician’s optimism
related to spirits may be attributed to this ability to alleviate pain
and enhance mood, effects that must have seemed quite remarkable during
a medical crisis that saw perhaps two thirds of Europe’s population
culled in a single generation.
Economic recovery following the subsidence of the plague throughout
Europe led to new standards of luxury and increased urbanization. This
age witnessed unprecedented ostentation, gluttony, self-indulgence and
inebriation. Europe, relieved to have survived the pestilence of the
14th century, went on what might be described as a continent- wide
bender. Despite the negative effects of drunkenness and attempts by
authorities to curtail drinking, the practice continued until the 17th
century, when beverages made with boiled water became popular. Coffee,
tea, and cocoa thus began to break alcohol’s monopoly on safe beverages.
In the 18th century, a growing religious antagonism toward alcohol,
fueled largely by Quakers and Methodists and mostly in Great Britain,
still lacked real effect or popular support. After all, the Thames River
of the time was as dangerous a source of drinking water as the polluted
streams of ancient times. Dysentery, cholera and typhoid, all using
filthy water as a vehicle, were major killers until the end of the 19th
century, rivaling plague in mass destruction.
Only the realization that microorganisms caused disease and the
institution of filtered and treated water supplies finally made water a
safe beverage in the West. Religious anti-alcohol sentiment and potable
water would combine with one other factor to make it finally possible
for a significant percentage of the public to turn away from alcohol.
That other factor was the recognition of alcohol dependence as an
illness.
Diseases of Alcohol
In the 19th century the application of scientific principles to the
practice of medicine allowed clinical symptoms to be categorized into
diseases that might then be understood on a rational basis. Alcohol
abuse was among the first medical problems approached this way. Two
graduates of the Edinburgh College of Medicine, Thomas Trotter of
Britain and Benjamin Rush of the colonies and then the U.S., published
essays on drunkenness in the early 1800’s. They saw alcoholism as a
chronic, life-threatening disease and recognized that habitual and
prolonged consumption of hard liquor causes liver disease, accompanied
by jaundice, wasting, and mental dysfunction, evident even when the
patient was sober. The influence of moralistic anti-alcohol Methodism
may have driven their clinical research, but their findings were
nonetheless sound.
As a prominent member of society and a signer of the Declaration of
Independence, Rush’s writings carried great weight. His personal fame
and correct diagnosis of a societal ill helped to create viewpoints that
eventually culminated in the American Prohibition (1919-1933).
Nineteenth-century studies detailed the clinical picture and
pathological basis of alcohol abuse, leading to today’s appreciation of
it as one of the most important health problems facing America and the
rest of the world. Alcohol contributes to 100,000 deaths in this country
annually, making it the third leading cause of preventable mortality in
the U.S. (after smoking and conditions related to poor diet and a
sedentary way of life).
The overall alcohol problem is far broader. Some 40% of Americans
have been intimately exposed to the effects of alcohol abuse through a
family member. And every year some 12,000 children of drinking mothers
are robbed of their potential, born with the physical signs and
intellectual deficits associated with full-blown fetal alcohol syndrome;
thousands more suffer lesser effects.
Society and science are at the threshold of new pharmaceutical and
behavioral strategies against alcoholism. In historical terms, it has
only just been understood and accepted as a disease; we are still coping
with the historically recent arrival of concentrated alcohol. The
diagnosis having been made and acknowledged, continued research can be
counted on to produce new and more effective treatments based on the
growing knowledge of the physiology of alcohol abuse and of addictive
substances in general.
Humanity at any moment of history is inevitably caught in that time,
as trapped as an insect in amber. The mores, traditions, and attitudes
of an era inform the individuals then living, often blinding them to the
consideration of alternatives. Alcohol today is a substance primarily of
relaxation, celebration, and tragically mass destruction. To consider it
as having been a primary agent for the development of an entire culture
may be jolting, even offensive to some. Any good physician, however,
takes a history before attempting a cure.
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