Anthropology

APRIL 27, 2019 | KIRSTY VITARELLI
AN EMPIRE BUILT ON BEER

Archeologists have been researching how an ancient Peruvian empire was so successful that it lasted for centuries — and it turns out the answer is… beer.

With his team at the Field Museum in Chicago, curator Ryan Williams discovered a site at Cerro Baúl in the mountains of southern Peru that once served as a kind of microbrewery for the Wari civilization. Predecessors to the Incas, the Wari flourished from roughly 600 AD to 1,000.

The Field Museum team analyzed fragments of pots and discovered that the Wari brewed beer with ingredients including a local drought-resistant berry. Use of this berry meant the beer could be produced and enjoyed even in the leanest of seasons.

The ‘chicha’ beer — light in alcohol content and sour in taste — had a shelf life of only a week at most, so it had to be drunk where it was made.

More:
https://whowhatwhy.org/2019/04/27/an-empire-built-on-beer/