I started Shore Craft Beer in 2014 to help highlight the breweries here on the Shore and to develop tourism around craft beer here. I was challenged into this act by someone who said craft beer was a fad and that women didn’t like craft beer. I worked for an airline in 1985 where we started putting Sam Adams on our planes exclusively which was particularly popular on our flights between Logan International in Boston and our hub at Dulles. I didn’t like beer until there was craft beer. I was focused on a movement that was 35 – 40 years old in the United States. We learned recently that a large brewery has just been discovered in ancient Egypt.
Remains of Ancient Brewery Found in Abydos, Egypt
This brewery site dates back to 3100 BC when King Narmer ruled. He was considered to be the unifier of Egypt and founder of the First Dynasty. Dr. Matthew Adams, one of the leaders of the expedition that found the brewery believes that the beer was used in royal burial rituals for Egypt’s early kings. “Evidence for the use of beer in sacrificial rites was found during excavations in these facilities.”
According to Abydos.org which describes Abydos archaeology, Abydos was “Egypt’s most important religious center and burial place of its earliest kings — is situated along a low desert terrace between two promontories jutting out from the cliffs that shelter the site in a sandy bay.”
Production Capacity of 22,400 Litres
Forty clay pots were found that were used to warm mixtures of grain and water. Natural yeasts found their way into these pots of cooked grains and began the fermentation process. According to Reuters, the brewery was split into eight sections for brewing. Each area was 65 feet long and contained about 40 pots arranged in two rows. The pots were “held in place by levers made of clay placed vertically in the form of rings.”
Beer Tourism
The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism is hoping that this new brewery site will help revive the tourism industry in Egypt which, like here, has been decimated by COVID. The site is located in the northern part of Egypt near Luxor, a popular tourism destination in recent times.
