Producing about 3000 bottles of red and white wine is not something you just do at home. For that, a bodega in good condition is certainly necessary. And that is exactly what a team of American and Israeli researchers came across. They discovered a bodega about 3,700 years old in the Near East! That could just be the oldest and largest bodega in this region. The bodega, with its banquet hall, was discovered among the ruins of a Canaanite city in Israel. Covered by a thick layer of debris consisting of bricks, mud, and plaster. Probably caused by an earthquake.
The team made the discovery in Tel Kabri, in northern Israel (a ruined town dating back to some 1,700 BC), while excavating the great palace that once belonged to the city's governors. At first they stumbled upon a three-foot wine jug that they would later name “Bessie” (no idea why). Mr. Eric H. Cline, affiliated with the George Washington University and also one of the people responsible for this excavation, says about this; “We went on and on digging, and suddenly more friends of “Bessie” appeared. First five, then ten, fifteen ... and so it went on to no less than 40 wine jugs, all stored in a warehouse measuring about five by eight meters. This is a very important discovery which we believe is the oldest and largest bodega discovered ever.”
The forty wine jugs together have a capacity of around 2000 liters, which, compared to today, would be comparable to about 3000 bottles of wine. Mr. Assaf Yasur-Landau of the University of Haifa, who is also the other person in charge of these excavations, explains that the bodega is located close to a large dining hall. This space was used by Tel Kabri's elite (and possibly foreign guests as well) to host large eating and drinking parties with goat meat and richly flowing wine.
The taste of honey and cinnamon:
In the beginning it was not yet certain that these jars were used for the storage of wine. To verify this, they enlisted the help of Doctor Koh, affiliated with the University of Brandeis (Massachusetts). This Dr., who was also closely associated with the entire project, studied fragments of this pottery and analyzed the organic remains that had remained on them. He found traces of tartaric acid and syringic acid (one of the dyes in red wine, called maldivin, slowly breaks down into syringic acid over time). Both substances are important elements related to wine. In addition, he found other ingredients that were common for the production of wine at the time, such as honey, mint, cinnamon, juniper berries and resin. The “wine recipe” found is very similar to the medicinal wines that were used in ancient Egypt from 2000 years ago. “These wines were not just any brew invented by someone in the attic,” says Dr. Koh, “during the investigations it turned out that the wine (residues) found in each pitcher were exactly the same, which indicates a professional approach. This confirms our suspicion of the first, real, and therefore oldest bodega ever”.
The researchers would now like to continue with the analyzes to find out exactly how the composition of these wines was at the time. This with the aim of copying it exactly in order to find out the taste of the ancient times.
Tutankhamun:
Another mystery that had occupied scientists for a long time was the wine they found in the times of Tutankhamun. Maria Guasch, affiliated with the University of Barcelona (Spain), managed to solve a 3,500-year-old mystery in her laboratory. She had managed to get the Egyptian government to take samples of a wine jar from this young king's tomb. The text on the wine jug: “Year 5, wine from the house of Tutankhamun, ruler of Thebes, life, prosperity and health, on the Western River, by the court winemaker Khaa” of course suggested that there was wine in it, but what kind of wine was still a mystery. Eventually Maria also found the same two substances as described above; tartaric acid and syringic acid. And as we now know, the latter only occurs in red wine… and therefore this riddle has been solved as well.
Roel Peters RP-Vinos USA
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