A History of the World in 6 Glasses P. 69-129

Summary:

The Imperial Vine:

Conflicts between Greek and Rome are arising and it's all leading to the vines that makes wine. The Romans are gaining popularity by simply copying the Greeks' culture, techniques, and business. Then the Romans wanted the vines that's located in Greek islands to be transported and transplanted to Italy. The Romans pretty much duplicated how the Greek made their wines. Ever since Rome started making more and more wines, people stopped caring about beers and only wanted wine. Just like beer, wine was consumed and enjoyed by all sorts of different people, ranging from age to class. Another thing that the Romans copied from the Greek is how to drink their wine in a civilized manner, meaning having water mixed in with their wine. Lastly, wine played a crucial role as to why Christian do drink wine and Muslims do not. Bread and wine symbolizes Christ's body and blood that he sacrificed for everyone so it would be an honorable thing to actually drink the wine as well as eat the bread. As for Muslims, they believed that Satan is sending them wine and gambling to disrupt their innocent minds and that they should abstain from drinking and gambling at all times. 

High Spirits, High Seas:

Near the first millennium AD, Cordoba of Arab Andalusia was considered the most cultured city in western Europe because of all the developments they had during that time. They offered parks, palaces, paved rads, mosques, libraries, and so much more. They also looked back on the knowledge of the Greek to invent and brainstorm further items and ideas. Arab chemists developed how to distill wine to use specific items for other researches. Thanks to distilled drinks, it may it a whole lot easier for people to store and transport it to other places. Distilled water plus a little bit of fire always helped a lot in the medical field because it was very strong, strong enough to cure sicknesses and relieves pain. Distilled water can also be known as aqua vitae, and introducing it to the medical field was a success. Since beer and wine is getting a tad expensive to ship to places, Ligon decided to create a drink that won't spoil as fast and be made in large quantities; He called it kill-devil, rumbullion, or rum (for short). Slaves take advantage of rum because it actually helped them to stay on task and dealt with any hardship/labor. So, the creation of rum helped make those who consumed it more energetic and way more affordable than beer and wine.

The Drinks That Built America:

Almost anyone could afford rum back in the days because it was so darn cheap. But not enough molasses was being produced to support how much rum is being made so, distillers were forced to decrease making rum but they didn't listened. They kept their extremely cheap prices and used smuggled molasses to make it. That all led to the Molasses Act, which then led to a few more acts during the French and Indian War. Unfortunately, many supplies of molasses was ruined so distillers had a difficult time producing rum. So, whiskey took the placement of rum because it only needed staple products to make and even cheaper than rum.  

Quote:

"Many great events have proceeded from much smaller causes." (Standage 121).

Reaction:

I agree with this quote because all of the proof is in the text, itself. During the years of learning history, I haven't learned nor talked much about the Molasses Act. But I've read a lot about French and Indian War, and how there were many acts that came after one another. For example, the Boston Massacre which led to the Boston Tea Party and that led to the Sugar Act and so forth. After reading this specific passage, it all began because of a beverage, rum. Because of the Molasses Act, many people have fought and stood up for what they believe in by facing the multiple acts that were trying to bring them down. YEAH, FIGHT THE POWER!... :)

A History of the World in 6 Glasses P. 9-68

Summary:

A Stone-Age Brew:

50,000 years ago, human beings had to travel in small groups and lived in caves, huts, and if they're lucky, tents. To provide food supply, humans had to hunt and fish for anything they can get their hands on. But as time progresses, humans' lifestyle began to changed. Instead of hunting for food, people started to learn how to farm and grow crops. An advantage of be able to farm is that it's stable. Humans didn't have to move from one river to another forest. Since farming were spreading, this helped them to settle down into small villages which then grew into the world's very first cities. After having a stable place to live in, humans starts to invent and develop copious new useful items. Another genius "invention" was made during the change of their lifestyle. Instead of regular, good ol' water, humans realized that from barley and wheat, a new beverage can be made. Ever since this drink was made, it was essential and staple to social, religious, and economic life. Around 10,000 BCE, beer was discovered by humans. So, as the years passes by, humans created more beer flavors and even meanings of different kinds of beers for specific occasions.

Civilized Beer:

You can officially become a human after you consume bread and beer! Well, at least that's how it was back in 3400 BCE. Actually, the Mesopotamians believed that consuming bread and beer makes it easier for others to differentiate between humans and savages. Beer also played an important part in ancient Egyptian culture and time period which was in 2650 BCE. The Egyptians thought that beer had deep, spiritual, and mythological origins which is why they mentioned and/or have beer present during prayers, death ceremonies, and so forth. Both in Mesopotamia and Egypt, beer was consumed and liked by pretty much everyone, whether they're old or young, rich or poor, and male or female. Not only was beer used for drinking, it was also used for specific medical reasons. It was more safer to use beer than actual water because beer was less likely to be contaminated with any bacteria. Overall, having beers present during special occasions have brought many people altogether :]

The Delight in Wine:

Wine was really known and introduced during 870 BCE, to be more specific, King Ashurnasirpal II of Assyria's feast. He had roughly 69, 574 people that attended his feast. He provided copious food, plenty for everyone to eat. But the most astounding thing there was his choice of drink. He, himself had a bowl of wine instead of a cup of beer to show how much wealth he had. Wine was fairly expensive and difficult for an abundance of people to have, so them trying wine at the feast was the first for many. After trying wine for the first time, wine productions started to increase and wine was being transporting to more areas. Wine slowly made its way into human's life by making it more accessible. The Greek then added their own little touch to wine, by adding water to it. Because of the newly Greek way to drink wine, the water actually made the wine safer to drink, and vice versa. Even Greek philosophers thought that wine was a fabulous beverage and a good way to test a man's character.

Quote:

""Wine reveals what is hidden"" (Standage 62).

Reaction:

I chuckled when I saw this quote from a Greek philosopher in this chapter. :P I can relate to this quote because numerous of people have told stories about how they would get drunk and started spilling the truth about everything! I even witnessed an adult go on and on about something when he was drunk. It was quite entertaining to watch, haha. It seriously amazes me how someone that lived in the third century BCE made this statement and even in the modern times, it's still happening. I wonder what in particularly that's in wine, beer, and/or alcohol, in general, that makes a lot of people spit out the truth...hm :P