Alcohol is one of the longest-used products
in human history, has been used as a currency by many civilizations, and is an ingredient
for 3 of the 10 most consumed beverages. To stay in the ‘spirit’ of things, I’ll
be drinking along while recording this video… So you might want to turn on subtitles. And if YOU want to join me and it’s LEGAL
for you to drink, then feel free to join me. Afterall, “Idle hands are the Devil’s
Tools”. Hey! It wouldn’t be the first time people used
my videos as a drinking game! We don’t know when people first consumed
alcohol. But we do know we weren’t the first. There are many species who have evolved defense
mechanisms against alcohol. Bats in Latin America eat fermented fruits
with ease, certain species of bees don’t allow drunk bees to return to their hive,
while the pen-tailed tree shrew spends 2 hours every day drinking fermented palm nectar without
getting drunk. Because fermentation is a common natural process,
we cannot be certain when humans first consumed alcohol. The best guesses of scientists point out that
humans likely figured out fruits ferment when held in some sort of container and could be
consumed for a light buzz. In fact, the very first evidence of humans
intentionally creating alcohol comes from China, at around 7.000 BCE. Researchers analysed the chemical composition
of a jar and found a concoction of fermented rice, honey, and hawthorne leafs, which was
likely an intentional method to create wine. So let’s all raise a glass of wine to the
first alcoholic beverage in recorded history! Whether winemaking spread from China or was
invented independently elsewhere we don’t know. But we do know that 1.000 years later the
first grapevines were cultivated in the caucasus. By the year 4.000 BCE, Mesopotamia created
a thriving winemaking industry. But so far every alcoholic drink came from
fermented fruits. This is how wine is made. But in Mesopotamia people learned of a new
method to create alcohol. They put grain in hot water, which over the
course of a few ours added alcohol to the liquid. And so the first beer was created, which is
fermented grains rather than fermented fruit. So let’s raise our cup to the very first
beer in history. And while the knowledge of wine production
took 1.000s of years to mature into an industry with vineyards and professional winemakers,
beer took only about 500 years to create the very first brewery. This was in Egypt, in Hierakonpolis, producing
about 1.100 litre of beer every day. And it’s ancient Egypt that we get the first
writings on how they used alcohol. Some things are different. For example, beer was used as payment and
to quench thirst. This was in a time before modern sanitation,
meaning water was far more likely to be polluted than beer and beer only had around 1% alcohol
at the time. But there are also a lot of things that haven’t
changed. It is used recreationally during festivals
and feasts, as a social lubricant to help people open up, and played an important role
in various religious rituals. Over time beer became as important to the
Babylonians in the middle east as it was to Egypt. In Babylon the first laws concerning alcohol
were laid down in the Code of Hammurabi… but rather than talking about the consumption
of alcohol, it only addressed the fair commerce of alcohol. And the Egyptians and middle easterners exported
their wine and beer across the Mediteranian Sea and to India. In India people found a third way of making
alcoholic beverages. In 1.700 BCE people discovered how to ferment
honey and turn it into a drink. And so let's raise our flagon to another dead
dragon because there is just one drink you need: Mead. Meadmaking became especially popular in colder
regions, Such as Nepal, Central Europe, Russia. This was because keeping bees was usually
easier than harvesting enough grain or fruits. And around this time India made another major
scientific discovery in the field of alcohol: distillation. You see, when yeast converts sugars or carbohydrates
into alcohol it can only naturally do so up to a point. But with distillation this alcohol could be
extracted, allowing a higher % of alcohol in people’s drinks. And so India created the first liquor. While today liquor means that it contains
at least 15% alcohol, back then the technology only allowed a few percentage points of alcohol. While the rest of the world drank mead, beer,
and wine, China shifted towards drinking Huangjiu, which is a type of rice wine… China… How could you? But it actually makes sense as Rice cultivation
allows you to produce a lot more calories than with other types of grains. And this type of drink has remained popular
with the Chinese all the way to today. Back in the west, Rome rose to prominence.They
figured out how to make wine ‘age’ and constructed vineyards across their empire. They considered wine to be ‘democratic’,
because it was consumed by all the people: from the highest noble to the lowest slave,
man and woman, peasant and aristocrat. It was such an important product that when
Rome’s borders expanded, so too had the wine trade to provide all the Roman soldiers
and colonists with sufficient wine. While the Romans had access to beer, they
prefered wine. In fact, Romans liked their wine so much that
they often noted disparagingly that the Germanic peoples liked to drink beer… In that regard nothing has really changed… Just to add a personal story: When I lived
in Berlin it was IMPOSSIBLE not to see at least SOMEONE drinking beer in public. I honestly thought that was in all the wrong
neighbourhoods and the people around me were alcoholics. So I asked and no, they weren’t alcoholic,
they were just German: At the shop? Drinking beer. In the train? Drinking beer. At work on the phone next to me talking to
customers? Drinking beer. When the middle ages rolled around, Middle-Eastern
scientists improved upon the distillation process by inventing the distillation still. This allowed people to get higher percentages
of alcohol out of their distillation process. And most importantly, they discovered ethanol. Ethanol is the alcoholic chemical which makes
people drunk. But while many inventions into alcoholic beverages
originated in the middle east, it’s also the place where Islam rooted itself. With Islam came a negative view on consuming
alcohol, leading to its prohibition. And such controls of alcohol by states and
religions is quite common throughout history. In the 20th century the USA tried to prohibit
the production of alcohol, while the USSR tried to limit the sale of alcohol. And while it’s often thought of as a very
modern thing for governments to do, it’s actually a very old practise. As Chinese commentator nearly 2.700 years
ago said people “will not do without beer. To prohibit it and secure total abstinence
from it is beyond the power even of sages. Hence, therefore, we have warnings on the
abuse of it." And this commentator was right. Throughout history there have been thousands
of cases of governments and religions trying to control alcohol sales or production. While many Islamic societies ban the substance,
ancient Egypt worshipped Osiris, the god of beer, among other matters. But Roman Catholicism, however, believes that
wine can literally turn into the blood of their god and has often joined prohibition
movements. So far such bans either don’t have enough
data to make a conclusion, or they are failures: People will produce or import alcohol illegally. In the USA and USSR people brewed their own
alcohol, which were of low quality, causing permanent damage to its drinkers… all of
which could have been avoided if they had opened a few history books, making this a
great example of why learning history is important. By the 15th century the process of distillation
finally allowed for proper liquor to be produced. And with higher alcohol content came the introduction
of new types of drinks. Too many to mention all at once, but to give
a few examples are whiskey, which is a distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented grain
mash; Brandy, which is distilled wine; and gin, which is distilled juniper wine. And gin actually has an interesting history:
It was originally called ‘jenever’ in Dutch, but the English pronounced it Geneva,
and when it reached France the people shortened it to just ‘gin’. By 1743 England produced 18 million gallons
of gin per year. In the early 19th century British soldiers
in India drank their malaria medicine in tonic water. But this was bitter. So soldiers added water, sugar, and lime to
improve the taste. And thus, gin and tonic was born. Die Nacht ist jung und der Teufel lacht, komm
wir schenken uns jetzt ein. (The night is young and the devil laughs,
come, we’ll poor ourselves another) While Afroeurasia was inventing more and more
new types of alcoholic drinks, it is important that we don’t forget the Americas either. Unfortunately, we don’t have as detailed
a history of the Americas. We do know that the production of Alcohol
probably never reached further north than where the South of the USA is today. Meaning millions of people had no idea alcohol
even existed until the European arrived. But when the European did arrive, the native
Americans gladly traded European alcoholic drinks for local resources. In Central America people made wine out of
cocoa since at least 1.100 BCE, mead made from local honey, and even beer made from
corn. They also had their own unique type of alcoholic
drink called Pulque, which is white and has a sour yeast-like taste. Which you can still buy today if you want
to. The Europeans soon colonized the Americas
and started harvesting sugarcane using slave labour. Some of those slaves discovered that molasses,
a byproduct of the sugar refining process, could be fermented into alcohol. Eventually someone added distillation to this
process and created the very first modern rum. Ironically, this made the slave trade even
worse as sugar was now even more profitable to produce. Over time rum came to be associated with piracy
as many privateers in the carribean started trading in rum. When rum overtook brandy as the most traded
alcoholic beverage in the Carribean, sailors were starting to get paid in rum. When those privateers became pirates, their
fondness of rum remained. And so the association between rum and piracy
was established. So join me with a yohoho and a bottle of rum! In the 19th century the industrial revolution
changed the lives of people in a significant way. More factories were being built, meaning a
lot of people were needed to man the machines, this in turn meant that a lot of people started
living cities. Society at the time wasn't prepared to deal
with this urbanisation. Long workdays, few vacations, people packed
into cities filled with disease... At the same time those same people started
forming a middle class. And so with more problems and more money,
many people found escape from their new harsh reality in alcohol. But rather than dealing with the underlying
problems industrialisation was creating, many organisations simply blamed alcohol. High crime rates, poverty, disease... they
were all blamed on alcohol. And in a world where people don't have a proper
grasp on sociology, economics, and biology it's easy to come to this conclusion. But as alcohol seemed to cause more problems,
scientists started using all the new technologies of industrialisation to understand exactly
what alcohol was. What is it made of? How is it created? What effects does it have on people? Louis Pasteur discovered the connection with
microscopic yeast cells and the fermentation process. He discovered yeast cells convert sugars into
alcohol and carbon dioxide, which he discovered in the 1850s. But he didn’t discover the mechanism itself. Various scientists would add to this work
over the next 100 years, figuring out the exact process of turning sugar into alcohol. A process which is far too complicated for
me to explain in a history video, so I left a link in the description. But by 1940 the process was finally understood
and was named the Embden–Meyerhof–Parnas pathway... So humans only understand how alcohol is created
for less than a century. As our technology improved and humans gained
access to more safe drinks, people moved away from alcohol. Coffee, tea, and water replaced alcoholic
beverages. And with this societal change and scientific
understanding, humans started treating alcohol very differently now that it wasn’t needed
anymore. For example, while in the past we used very
broad rules such as “moderation”, today we have more specific rules such as specific
limits on alcohol consumption while driving a vehicle, limiting the sale of alcohol for
certain ages, and putting safety labels on products. And as our understanding of psychology increased,
we came to understand the underlying reasons for alcohol abuse. So now we have support groups for people who
get addicted, finally giving humanity a tool to combat the negative effects of alcohol. And for those of us who don’t have issues
with it, we now know that alcohol also causes various positive effects such reduced chances
of coronary heart disease, osteoporosis, and increases longevity. (A BIG thank you to all the people supporting
me on Patreon!) If you liked this video then please like and
subscribe for more content. If you don’t get all the references in this
video then I left a playlist for you with all the drinking songs mentioned in this video,
in the description below. The songs range from very German to very weird. This was Avery from History Scope, thank you
for watching Oh! And remember; don't drink and drive.
