The History of the World in 6 Glasses Questions

-it's impact after humans switched from a hunter-gatherer lifestyle to a more settled way of life. -became a staple beverage and was a central force to social, religious, and economic life.

-the connection relates back to the cereal grains in the Fertile Crescent. -once hunter-gatherers discovered cereal grains and the ability to store them for long periods of time, they were more inclined to leave their semi settled lives for more nomadic ones.

-creating the belief that the Osiris, the god of agriculture, discovered beer. -the physical features of this area include water and grain, so they believe that Osiris is the one who prepared the mixture of these two which lead to the creation of beer. -consider beer a gift from the gods, which is why it was used in many religious practices.

-beer civilized man by the status of one who consumed it -regarded the consumption of beer and bread as on of the things that distinguished them from savages and made them human. -beer has an association with a settled, orderly lifestyle, in contrast to the haphazard ways of the hunter-gatherers.

-Egyptians felt differently towards intoxication -Mesopotamians were relaxed towards it, the Egyptians had a strong disapproval expressed in practice texts copied out by apprentice scribes in Egypt.

-built by state employees, rather than by an army of slaves. -paid in beer. -one laborer's ration was three to four loaves of bread and two jugs of beer containing about four liters of beer. -brought the benefit of an instilled sense of national unity, demonstrated wealth and the power of state, and provided justification for taxation to Egyptian society.

-as wine production increased, the volume of wine being traded by sea did as well -made wine more available over a larger geographic region -fewer borders to cross, fewer taxes and tolls to pay, made transporting the good cheaper

-attempt of storing grapes or grape juice for a long period of time -pottery jars found in Hajji Firuz Tepe had a form of reddish residue, which is presumably wine. -climate is unsuitable for large-scale production. -raises the price significantly, makes it an expensive luxury item to sell, which could be beneficial for the manufacturers/sellers

-Greeks used wine as a mixture with their other crops, like olives, wheat, or barley -although it was often intertwined with these more mainstream and cheaper crops, wine still remained a luxury crop and was therefore still very expensive -not listed in ration tablets for slave workers or lower-ranking religious officials -access to wine was a mark of status

-suspicious of democracy -believed it interfered with the natural order of things, for example, obeying your elders when they were technically equals to you -believed that placing too much power into the hands of someone would lead to anarchy, at which point order could only be restored through tyranny -symposium was democratic, though not in a modern sense of the word -based on Athenian democracy, with the right to vote, not the Greek democracy, which relied on slaves to do the hard work

-because of the embodiment it had in the culture. -values that spread w/ wine: carefully calibrated social divisions, the reputation for unparalleled cultural sophistication, and encouragement of both hedonism and philosophical inquiries

-Greek symposium: the participants drank as equals pursuing pleasure and physiological enlightenment -convivium: served different wines to different people depending on their position in society, seen as an opportunity to emphasize social divisions, and not set them aside in a temporary alcoholic haze

-according to the Bible, Christ's first miracle was transforming six jars of water into wine. Christ is also known for offering wine to his disciples at the Last Supper, which led in it's role to the Eucharist -Christians regard drinking wine as a form of sacred communion -Muslims created a ban on alcohol because of the legend that Allah told Muhammad, a prophet, that alcohol was 'an abomination devised by Satan.' -with the rise of Islam, power shifted from the Mediterranean toward the desert tribes of Arabia. These tribes expressed their superiority and established their customs, which included the ban of alcohol -enforced some places more rigorously than others

-dated back to the fourth millennium BCE in northern Mesopotamia -simple distillation equipment is traced to have been used to make perfumes -Greeks and Romans were also familiar with the distillation technique, but it was not routinely applied to wine until the start of the practice in the Arab world -by Arab scholar Jabir ibn Hayyan, who is remembered as one of the fathers of chemistry

-when the Europeans started growing sugarcane, they realized that it required enormous amounts of water and manpower -Arabs have amassed a range of irrigation techniques and labor-saving devices, sugar production relied mostly on slaves brought in from East Africa -resulted in large trade and importation of slaves. -distilled drinks played a central role in this because of the option of using the drinks as currency. -although Africans would make their own alcohol with their grains, distilled spirits were far more valued, especially brandy -connections were further strengthened following the invention of rum

-price and availability -in the second half of the seventeenth century, rum became available -cheaper than brandy, it didn't have to be shipped, and was stronger -rum became the North American colonists' favorite drink -most profitable manufactured item produced in New England

-starter of the many laws that led to the Revolution -started with the Molasses Act, then the Sugar Act, onto the Stamp, Townshend, and Tea Acts. -critical in the previous events to the war, as well within the war -preferred drink of American soldiers -taxation of rum and molasses had given it a distinctly revolutionary flavor

-the settlers origin and supplies of molasses -most settlers were of a Scotch-Irish origin and had experienced grain distilling -supply of molasses ran low due to the war -settlers were able to cultivate grains such as wheat, barley, and rye now that they were away from the coast and more inland -moving the rum inland was expensive -whiskey could be made not depending on imported ingredients

-Alexander Hamilton imposed a federal excise duty on the production of distilled drinks -immediate outcry arose -excise seemed particularly unfair to the inland settlers -many settlers had come to America to get away from revenue collection and government interference -start of the Whiskey Rebellion -many farmers refused to pay the tax -resulted in violence and mobs. -although the excise failed, the Whiskey Rebellion forcefully illustrated that federal law could now be ignored, and it was a defining moment in the early history of the United States

-it was their replacement for wine -wine was banned, Arabs turned to coffee, especially to ward off sleep for overnight religious ceremonies -many Arabs opposed coffee, and said the ban on intoxicating beverages should apply to coffee, since it changes how you act -coffee failed to show the effects of intoxication. -it showed the exact opposite effects -coffee remains unbanned

-it's effects and it's status -people found the effects of coffee more intriguing than those of alcohol -more alert, and clear-headed -became a popular drink to scientists, intellectuals, merchants, and clerks -encouraged people to drink the beverage, the gain in social status was just as appealing

-because of where it was consumed -important conversations could be held -provided an entirely new environment for social, intellectual, commercial, and political exchange and growth

-coffeehouses became popular venues for academic discussion -many now-famous scientists would meet in coffeehouses to discuss theories -it was a coffeehouse discussion that lead to one of the greatest books in the history of science, written by Isaac Newton in 1687. -historical scientific discoveries were made through discussions in coffeehouses -as well as the merging of science and commerce -scientists and entrepreneurs teamed up to form companies to exploit new inventions and discoveries in navigation, mining, and manufacturing, which paved the way for the Industrial Revolution

-ideas of insurance and stock market use of coffeehouses -spirit of innovation and experiment gave rise to new business models in the form of innumerable novel variations on insurance, lottery, or joint-stock schemes -used coffeehouses as stock markets -period of rapid innovation in finance is known today as the Financial Revolution

-where the ideas of Revolution began, and where action of the Revolution took place -circulation of information in French coffeehouses was subject to strict government oversight -coffeehouses were filled with government spies, who wrote down conversations people had about the king, or their thoughts on rebelling -contrast between radical new ideas about how the world might be and how it actually was became most apparent in coffeehouses -first action of the revolution was at a coffeehouse, where people lept up on tables and started chaos in Paris.

-changing the world of medicine and with the effect of the drink -before tea was a domestic drink, it was a medicine -people noticed the effects of chewing on tea leaves and rubbing the leaves on wounds -helped to further their knowledge in medicine -Chinese also noticed that tea enhanced concentration and banished fatigue -was then considered an essential ingredient in the elixir of life, which furthered its production, selling, and trading, which meant more money, which meant a richer economy and society

-silk, tea, paper, and ceramics -Chinese sculpture, painting, and poetry was flourishing at this time -many foreign items were imported along with their cultural significance -includes clothing, hairstyles, sports, food, music and dance

-smuggling and adulteration -smuggling probably doubled the volume of imports -smuggling reduced when the duty levied on tea was sharply reduced in 1784 -adulteration is the stretching of tea by mixing it with ash and willow leaves, sawdust, flowers, and more -made the amount consumed far greater than the amount imported

-the difference it made with the workers -workers embraced tea for it's effects of sharpening the mind -helped keep the workers alert on long and tedious shifts and improved their concentration when operating fast-moving machines

-related to the British East India Company -at the height of the company, it generated more revenue than the British government -gave the company direct and indirect influence over the policies of England -many of the company's officials bought their way into Parliament

-sparking the American Revolution -started in the early 1770s, with the smuggling of tea in the British colonies -taken to smuggling tea from the Netherlands to avoid paying original tax on tea -smuggling reduced the sale and legal tea -left the company with nearly ten thousand tons of tea in warehouses -company's solution was to get the government to intervene in it's favor -government imposed the Tea Act of 1773 -act = government pay off the debt of the company, impose taxes on the colonists, and give the colonists the right to sell tea -company thought the colonists would be grateful -colonists were infuriated -boycotted British goods and refused to pay the tax -lead to the Boston Tea Party, which was when colonists, many of them merchants, boarded company ships and tipped 342 chests of tea overboard -lead to the close of the port of Boston by the British government -enraged the colonists even more -lead to the beginning of the Revolutionary War

-connected to opium trade because of exchange of opium and tea in the East India Company -company had to pay for it's tea in hard cash, in the form of silver -difficult to get a hold of & price was increasing rapidly -company turned to a monopoly they controlled, the cultivation and preparation of opium in India. -opium was a powerful narcotic used in medicine in ancient times, now illegal -increased the production of opium in order to use it in place of silver to buy tea. -went through several independent trading organizations to be able to say that they weren't doing anything illegal -connected to the Opium War of 1839-1842 because the trading lead to the British government stating that the ban on opium did not give the right to Chinese officials the right to seize and destroy goods (opium) belonging to British merchants -war was declared on the pretext of defending the right to free trade