The Republic of Wine

My father-in-law continued, Our ancestors attributed the invention of liquor to deities and made up beautiful and moving stories about it. Please look at your handouts.

The ancient Egyptians believed that liquor was discovered by Osiris, guardian of the dead. Liquor was offered as sacrifice to the ancestors, to raise their souls from suffering and give them wings on which to fly away to Paradise. Even those of us who are still alive feel a sensation of flying when we’re drunk. Therefore, the essence of liquor is the spirit of flying. The ancient Mesopotamians made Noah the brewer’s laureate. They said he not only created the human race anew but also gave humans the wonderful gift of liquor in order to avoid disasters. The Mesopotamians even identified the place where Noah made his liquor – Erivan.

The ancient Greeks had their own god of liquor; his name was Dionysus, the specialist in liquor among the Olympian gods and goddesses. He represented wild ecstasy, the unfettering of all shackles, the releasing of a soaring free spirit.

Religions that place great stock in spirituality have different explanations for the origin of liquor. Buddhism and Islam are replete with antipathy toward liquor, declaring it to be the source of all evil. On the other hand, Christianity considers liquor to be Jehovah’s blood, the material embodiment of His dedication to the salvation of the world. Christians believe that drinking wine will help them connect with God, correspond with God. It is profound that the Christian doctrine treats wine as a kind of spirit, even though we all know that liquor is a substance. But let me remind you all that anyone who treats liquor only as a material object will never become a true artist. Liquor is spiritual, a belief whose traces still remain in many languages. For instance, in the English language hard liquor is called ‘spirits.’ while the French language labels liquor with a high alcoholic content ‘spiritueux.’ These terms share a linguistic root with ‘spiritual.’

But we are materialists, after all. We emphasize the fact that liquor is spiritual simply because we want to let our minds spread their wings and fly high. When they are tired from flying, when they settle back to earth, they must still seek the origins of liquor among a pile of ancient written records. This is enormously satisfying work. An alcoholic beverage called ‘Soma’ and another called ‘Baoma’, both used in sacrificial rites, are mentioned in India’s oldest religious text and literary collection, the Veda. The Hebrew Old Testament often mentions ‘sour wine’ and ‘sweet wine’. Our ancient oracle bones record, ‘This liquor D to Dajia D D to Ding,’ meaning an offering of liquor to the dead, Dajia and Ding. There is another word on an oracle bone, change which Ban Gu of the Han Dynasty, in his ‘Interpretation of the White Tiger,’ interpreted this way: Chang is a brew made of the fragrance of all plants. Chang meaning fine liquor, is synonymous with unrestrained, satisfying, enjoyable, unstoppable, unhindered: as in unrestrained access, unrestrained good cheer, unrestrained talking, unrestrained passage, unrestrained imagination, unrestrained drinking… Liquor is the embodiment of this free realm. So far, the earliest known record of liquor found in other parts of the world is a cork excavated from a prehistoric tomb in Egypt. On it we find the seal of Ramses the Third’s brewery (1198-1166 BC).

Let me give you more examples of early written records on liquor. For instance, ‘li’ in Chinese means a kind of sweet liquor; ‘bojah’ in ancient Hindu is a liquor made of grain extracts; in an Ethiopian tribal language, liquor made from barley is called ‘bosa’. ‘Cer visia’ in old Gallic, ‘Pior’ in old German, ‘eolo’ in old Scandinavian, and ‘bere’ in old Anglo-Saxon are all terms for beer in various ancient people’s languages. Fermented mare’s milk was called ‘koumiss’ by ancient nomads on the Mongolian steppe, and ‘masoun’ by the Mesopotamians. Mead was called ‘melikaton’ by the ancient Greeks, ‘aqua musla’ by the ancient Romans and ‘chouchen’ by the Celts. The ancient Scandinavians often gave mead as a wedding gift, which is the origin of ‘honeymoon,’ a term still in use all around the world. Written records such as these can be found everywhere in ancient civilizations, and it is impossible to list them all.

Quoting a big chunk of my father-in-law’s handout has probably annoyed the hell out of you. Sorry. I’m bored out of my skull too, but I have no choice. Please bear with me a little longer, it’ll be over soon, just another minute. Regrettably, we can only go back to circa the tenth century BC to ascertain the origins of liquor through written records. It is perfectly legitimate to speculate that the origins of liquor predate recorded history, since many archeological finds provide sufficient evidence. The history of liquor exceeds ten thousand years, excavated evidence for which includes a clay liquor tripod from Longshan, China, beautifully crafted ‘zun’ and ‘jia’ wine vessels from Da Wen Kou, and the liquor rites on a fresco found in Spain’s Altamira caves.

Students, my father-in-law said, liquor is an organic compound, naturally produced as one of Nature’s ingenious creations. It is made of sugar transformed by enzymes into alcohol, plus some other ingredients. There are so many plants with sugar content that they will never be exhausted. Fruits with high sugar content, like grapes, are easily broken down by enzymes. If a pile of grapes is brought to a low, moist place by the wind, water, birds or animals, the proper amount of water and the right temperature can activate the enzymes on the skins to turn grape juice into sweet, delicious liquor. In China, an old saying goes, ‘Apes make liquor.’ The ancient text ‘Evening Talks in Penglong’ records the following: ‘There are many apes in Mount Huang. In the spring and summer, they pick flowers and fruits, and place them in a low place among rocks, where the mixture ferments into liquor with an aroma that can be detected for several hundred paces.’ An ‘Occasional Note from Western Guang’ in Miscellaneous Jottings records: ‘Apes abound in the mountains of such Western Guang prefectures as Pingle. They are skilled in plucking flowers to make liquor. When woodcutters enter the mountains, those who find their nests can retrieve several pints of liquor. It is fragrant and delicious, and has been named Ape Liquor.’ Now if apes knew how to pick a variety of fruits and put them in a shallow place to brew liquor, how much more likely is it for our human ancestors? Other countries have stories similar to that of apes making liquor. For instance, French brewers generally believe that birds collect fruit in their nests, but unforeseen incidents prevent them from swallowing the fruit. As time passes, birds’ nests become containers for making liquor. Humans must have been inspired by birds and beasts in their pursuit of the secrets of making liquor. The natural appearance of liquor and the emergence of plants with sugar content probably occurred at about the same time. So it is safe to say that, before there were humans, the earth was already permeated with the aroma of liquor.

So when did humans actually start distilling liquor? The answer to this question lies in the discovery by humans of the existence of liquor in Nature. Some of the boldest ones, or those who were dying of thirst, drank the liquor in shallows among the rocks or from the birds’ nests. After tasting this marvelous elixir and experiencing great pleasure, they flocked off to look for more shallows among the rocks and for more birds’ nests. The motivation to make their own liquor naturally occurred after they had drunk all the liquor they could find. Imitation followed motivation; they copied monkeys by throwing fruit into shallows and into birds’ nests. But they didn’t always succeed; sometimes the fruit dried up and sometimes it simply rotted away. Many times humans abandoned their quest to learn from the apes, but the overpowering seductiveness of the elixir enticed them into summoning their courage and starting over again with their experiments. Eventually, their experiments succeeded, and a fruity liquor was created with Nature’s help. Ecstatic, they danced naked in their fire-lit caves. This process of learning how to make liquor occurred simultaneously with a mastery of planting crops and domesticating animals. When grains replaced meat and fish as the people’s main staple, they began experimenting with the fermentation of grains. The motivation for these experiments might have been accidental, or might have come as a revelation from God. But when the first drop of liquor formed from steam accumulating in an earthenware still, human history turned a new, magnificent page. It was the start of the glorious age of civilization.

That ends my lecture, my father-in-law announced.

Now that class was over, my father-in-law gulped down the remaining liquor in his flask and smacked his lips repeatedly. Then he put it in his pocket, stuffed his briefcase under his arm, and, after casting me a mean yet meaningful glance, walked out of the classroom, head held high, chest thrust out.

Four years later, I graduated from college and took an exam to become my father-in-law’s graduate student. The title of my thesis was ‘Latin American “Magic Realist” Novels and the Distilling of Liquor.’ It won high praise from my father-in-law, and I passed the oral defense with ease. It was even sent to the Journal of Brewer’s College, where it was published as the leading essay. My father-in-law accepted me as his Ph.D. student and happily approved my area of research: How are a distiller’s emotions manifested in the physics and chemistry of the distilling process, and how do they affect the overall taste of a liquor? My father-in-law believed that my topic, with its fresh angle, was both highly significant and highly interesting. He suggested that I spend a year in the library, reading all the relevant books and collecting sufficient materials, before sitting down to write.

Following my father-in-law’s instructions, I threw myself, body and soul, into my studies at the Liquorland Municipal Library. One day I found a rare book called Strange Events in Liquorland, which