Media Roundup / Field Diary 2021.2 © Abydos Archaeology
Worldwide interest in the discovery that the predynastic brewery at North Abydos is Egypt’s first royal brewery and possibly the world’s oldest industrial-scale brewery has made at least one thing clear: Beer is a big part of what makes us human (and, as it turns out, a big part of what makes humans into gods, too). But headlines, as we all know, never tell the whole story—archaeology does.
Image courtesy of ABInBev © 2021
Image courtesy of ABInBev © 2021
Image courtesy of ABInBev © 2021
Image courtesy of ABInBev © 2021
The Abydos royal brewery doesn’t just sit on the edge of ancient space at Abydos, where it lay lost and nearly forgotten for more than a century—it also sits on the edge of ancient time. The scale of the brewery at full production capacity is simply mind-blowing. Imagine more than 300 cooking vats fired up at once, five thousand years into the deep past when no humans—so far as we know—had ever seen the burning fires of a factory like this one before. Earlier research on predynastic brewery sites at Tell el-Farkha, Hierakonpolis, Mahasna, and other parts of Abydos is a big part of how we know that this royal brewery is special: that it is an order of magnitude larger in scale, with all the implications for political economy that entails. This find has the power to tell us so much about life at the dawn of Egyptian history. We can’t wait to discover what else lies in store! Here is what we have planned next:
Further detailed documentation of the known brewery features
Determination of the full extent of the brewery area and the full scale of ancient production
Archaeobotanical and chemical analyses of organic residues
C14 dating and species identification of wood charcoal—the remains of wood fuel—from the brewery
Lecture series integrating the royal brewery excavations and other recent research into the archaeology of predynastic and Early Dynastic Egypt at Abydos. To book a talk please send us an email.
Publication of field reports and results of the scientific analyses undertaken relating to the Abydos brewery
In the meantime, take a look beyond the headlines with this roundup of some of the best features from around the web that dig a little deeper into the story so far.
The BBC’s Eva Higginbotham, host of the Naked Scientists podcast, told project co-director Matthew Adams that the amount of beer being brewed at Abydos was enough to impress “even a British person!” Meanwhile, NPR’s Steven Davy, host of The World, decided to pass on tasting the lumpy beer.
Project co-director Deborah Vischak discussed the find with Princeton University and team archaeologist Mohammed Abu el-Yazid spoke live with Cairo 24 in Egypt. The director of Sohag Antiquities, Ashraf Okasha, also discussed the discovery at Abydos with Egypt’s TeN TV.
CBS News’ Ahmed Shawkat had some questions for Matthew Adams, who also got down to the nitty gritty with Mike Pomranz at Food & Wine Magazine.
One big question on a lot of people’s minds, like the folks at Radio New Zealand, was why beer? Others asked, IPA or Hefeweizen? And the hosts of La Hora del Regreso at W Radio Colombia wanted to know—was there any beer left for the archaeologists?
We’re especially grateful to NPR Morning Edition’s Noel King for suggesting the right way to celebrate the find. To Belgium’s modern mega-brewery ABInBev for their meme skills. To the tabloids for not taking pharaoh’s finest too seriously so we can all pour one out at the world’s oldest suds shop. And most importantly to the scientists, scholars, and all those who did take it seriously.
For exclusive raw footage of the brewery excavation in progress, a reminder to head over to our Instagram channel. And if you come across any interesting coverage out there or just want to chat about archaeology and beer, you can always drop us a line. Cheers!