Skip to main content

Beer and brewery in ancient Egypt

It is no exaggeration to say that beer was of central importance to ancient Egyptian society. Beer was enjoyed by both adults and children, was the staple drink of poor Egyptians but was also central to the diet of wealthy Egyptians. The gods were often made offerings of beer and beer was mentioned in the traditional offering formula. Wages were often paid in beer (and other supplies) and the workmen living in the workers village at Giza received beer three times a day as part of their rations.

There is some evidence that as a staple foodstuff, ancient Egyptian beer was not particularly intoxicating. Rather it was nutritious, thick and sweet.

"strongly influenced by the addition of fruit or spices as flavoring."



A beer strainer being used like a straw, straight from the beer jar! Beer, called hqt by the ancients and zythus by the Greeks, was a very important Egyptian drink. It was a drink for adults and children alike. It was the staple drink of the poor (wages were sometimes paid in beer), it was a drink of the rich and wealthy, and a drink offered to the gods and placed in the tombs of the dead.

Workmen at the pyramids of the Giza Plateau were given beer, thrice daily - five kinds of beer and four kinds of wine were found by archaeologists "poking through dumps, examining skeletons, probing texts and studying remains of beer jars, and wine vats" at Giza.


In 1990, the Egyptian Exploration Society approached Scottish and Newcastle Breweries for help. This was the beginning of a partnership which, over the past five years, has considerably increased the understanding of the brewing process as it was at the time of Tutankhamen.





Beer was depicted on the walls of the tombs, as were scenes of the ancient Egyptian brewery. It was probably very similar to the way beer is still produced in Sudan today. Traditionally, beer was regarded as a female activity as it was an off-shoot of bread making - the basis of the beer were loaves of specially made bread.

Broadly speaking, the established view of ancient Egyptian brewing, drawn from tomb scenes, is as follows. Beer loaves were made from a richly yeasted dough. Malt may or may not have been used. This dough was lightly baked and the resulting bread was crumbled and strained through a sieve with water. Ingredients like dates or extra yeast might have been added. The dissolved mixture was fermented in large vats and then the liquid was decanted into jars which were sealed for storage or transport.


Beer was often known as “Hqt” (“heqet” or “heket”), but was also called “tnmw” (“tenemu”) and there was also a type of beer known as haAmt (“kha-ahmet”). The determinative of the word Hqt (beer) was a beer jug.
Enjoy a day Tour to the tombs in Luxor to explore with an Egyptologist tour guide more about this article of Beer and Brewery in ancient Egypt .

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tomb of Pabasa (TT279)

Pabasa, who was also called Pabes, has a large tomb at Asasif, just outside the entrance to Hatshepsut’s temple at Deir el-Bahri. Like Ankh-hor, who held this important title after him, he was the ‘Chief Steward of the God’s Wife Nitocris’ (Neitiqert) during the reign of Saite king Psamtek I.  Pabasa’s tomb still has a large mudbrick superstructure. A steep flight of stairs leads down to the entrance of the subterranean levels and on the lintel above the doorway is a fine relief of a barque, adored by the souls of Pe and Nekhen, by the God’s Wife, Nitocris and by the deceased.  A small vestibule leads to a larger pillared sun court. The vestibule shows scenes of Pabasa’s funeral procession, including mourners and the ‘Abydos Pilgrimage’. There is a long text of Pabasa and depictions of his son, Thahorpakhepesh, who acted as sem-priest at his father’s funeral.  On the inner lintel of the entrance to the court, a relief shows Osiris and Re-Horakhty, in the cent...
Post a Comment
Read more

US authorities return eight stolen ancient Egyptian artifacts

US authorities agreed to return eight ancient Egyptian artifacts stolen and illegally smuggled out of the country. Today, upon his arrival from the United States, Minister of Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim announced that US authorities agreed to return eight ancient Egyptian artefacts stolen and illegally smuggled out of the country. The objects are to arrive next month. The pieces include the upper part of a painted anthropoid wooden sarcophagus from the Third Intermediate period depicting a face of a woman wea ring a wig decorated with coloured flowers. Two linen mummy wrappings covered with plaster and bearing paintings showing winged amulets pushing the sun disc are also among the artefacts. Hieroglyphic text showing the name and titles of the deceased are also found on the plaster cover. The third piece is a cartonage painted mummy mask from the Third Intermediate period while the fourth and fifth items are Middle Kingdom wooden boats. The other three items are lim...
Post a Comment
Read more

what exactly happened to the Sphinx's nose?

The Sphinx's Nose The nose of the Great Sphinx at Giza is made conspicuous by its absence. What happened to it? The popular story is that the troops of Napoleon Bonaparte used the nose for target practice in 1798. Drawings done for La Description de L'Egypte depict a noseless Sphinx. The Sphinx, 1743. In 1737, British traveler Richard Pococke visited Egypt and made a sketch of the Sphinx that was published six years later. The nose is shown intact, but Pococke likely exercised his poetic license by adding it when it was not there (earlier, in 1579, Johannes Helferich had further taken an artist's liberties by depicting the Sphinx with a nose -- and with decidedly female features). Frederick Lewis Norden, an artist and marine architect, also sketched the Sphinx in 1737. His detailed drawings, published in 1755, were more realistic and showed the Sphinx with no nose. It is very unlikely that Norden would omit the nose if it was present. We can conclude that the...
Post a Comment
Read more