Medieval Beer Brewing
The pub and all that goes with it is often regarded as a lynch pin of British culture, along with dry humour and queuing (though no one ever queues at a pub). Here in Newcastle, we even have our own unique brand of alcohol in the form of Newcastle Brown Ale.
But drinking and brewing beer is something that has a long and storied history. In this blog post, our team member Daniel Fitzgerald has a look at some aspects of brewing in medieval England. Our Outreach Officer, George Blair has also been looking at brewing some of his very own medieval ale right here at Newcastle Castle, so you can see that we’re enthusiastic about our beer!
A Brief History
Beer is one of humanity’s oldest tipples, known in Mesopotamia and Egypt as early as 6000 BCE, beer brewing probably arrived in Neolithic Europe by 5000 BCE, and was brewed from barley on other grains on a pretty small, domestic scale. Although wine was the more popular drink in much of the Roman Empire, Roman soldiers on Hadrian’s Wall sustained themselves with ‘cervesa’ - Celtic beer, which may have been known as ‘curum’ to the Britons. The Anglo-Saxons introduced the word “ale” into the English language, and even used the word ‘alu’ as a sort of magical healing word - clearly they were big believers in the power of a pint!
Anglo-Saxon cremation urn bearing the runes “ALU” meaning ‘ale’
Generally speaking, medieval brewing happened in three phases. The first was malting, involving the treatment of the brewing grain by converting the starch to sugar water. They were drenched in warm water, which released a chemical enzyme to let this process be carried out. The malted and unmalted grains would then be taken for the second phase: mashing. Water was added and all the grains mushed together while the enzyme made it into a sugary mix, known as wort. Finally, the liquid wort would be separated from the grain solids and placed in an urn for the fermentation phase. It would be left to either ferment on its own or have yeast added to help it along. Any remaining solid grains would likely be taken to be malted or mushed again with another batch, to ensure none of it was wasted.
An alehouse showing the broom above the door, image from the British Library Royal MS 10 E IV
LF Salzmann goes into more detail on the subject of English brewing. Their main product was ale, described by a contemporary of the 16th century as the Englishman’s ‘natural drink’. In the 12th century, it was described as the ‘people’s food in liquid form’. Some people brewed it in their own homes and could sell it to locals. To show they were open for business, they would take a broom and stick it above the door to their home, indicating theirs was an ale house. However, all ale had to be verified by an official taster before it could be sold. While this seems like it would be an enviable position, you have to remember they would be required to sample all of the drink. To give an idea of how much that would involve, Coventry in 1520 had 60 brewers for a population of 6600. If it was good, then fantastic. If not, well, you’d certainly be the first to know. However, there were measures for the selling of bad drink. In Coventry, a man who made bad wine was forced to drink it and then had it emptied all over him.
Hops were a part of the process that weren’t introduced until much later, particularly where the English were concerned. According to Fjarfelli, their earliest recorded use was in the 8th century. Initially, it was a practice that started in Germany, stemming from various hop gardens referenced there and later spread throughout the rest of Europe. Not only did it alter the flavour to a more bitter taste compared to the sweeter tasting ale, but it also increased its longevity, meaning it could be stored and kept, as well as transported and traded. Before that, beer and ale had to be brewed and sold locally due to its much smaller lifespan before it went flat and started to go off. It became a major part of trading for most Northern European towns and found its way overseas at the end of the 14th century to Britain.
A Tudor pattern books showing “hops” on the right next to hemp
The English took a rather nationalistic stance on their drink. They were reluctant to adopt hops into their brewing practices and beer was regarded as something to be kept to foreigners. One contemporary dismissed it since ‘it doth make a man fat and doth inflate the belly’, citing the physique of the Dutch as an example of this. In 1531, the royal brewer was forbidden from using hops in their brewing. Even so, an Act of Parliament permitted foreigners to continue their trade in England, mainly because most native born English folk didn’t want to drink their beer anyway and they still had a market from overseas travellers. However, as the 14th century went on, hops brewing became more popular when the longevity of hop-brewed beer became apparent and more money was being made. This was especially true in places like Sussex, where large numbers of hops began to be imported. Eventually, in 1577, a contemporary spoke of the old ale as thick and foulsome, cementing that beer had supplanted it.
Drunken Monks and Terrible Taxes
Birgitte Kamp details more about brewing in Medieval England and beyond. It may come as surprising to learn that one of the main sources of beer brewing in England was monasteries. They were the closest to brewing ale on what could be considered a commercial scale, brewing it for their brothers and for pilgrims. A monastery of St. Gall in Switzerland has surviving architectural plans which reveal the scale of one such operation: a Malthouse, a kiln, millroom, three breweries and storage cellars, brewing three different kinds of beer. One for monks, one for lay brothers and one for pilgrims.
The monks themselves drank their own product a lot since ale was a liquid. Therefore, like water, it wasn’t considered breaking their fast, like food was. It was used as a dietary supplement, along with being drunken for spiritual and medicinal purposes, regarded as a ‘ubiquitous social lubricant’. Venerable Bede even makes note of how monks were given to excessive drinking and how they cast off Christ by ‘giving themselves over to drunkenness’. In addition, the English clergy had a reputation in Europe for behaving in a manner very similar to football hooligans. Many monasteries actually became famous for the brews they made and would be given a good income from those who came to sample them. As beer brewing became more commercialised, this influence declined. A big reason was because local ruling authorities favoured these commercial breweries over monasteries for taxation purposes and it helped make up the windfall from lost taxes by the monastic groups.
An abbey cellarer sneaking a drink, courtesy of the British Library, Sloane 2435, f. 44v.
Tax was part of the reason why hops took a little while to take off. Before hops were introduced, all beer and ale had to be brewed with a substance called ‘gruit’ and it was forbidden to brew without it. The local ruler would tax the brewer on the amount of gruit they used in their brewing, which was used to flavour the drink. Hops brewing was prohibited for a long time partially because these rulers didn’t want to lose this valuable income. As hops became more popular, lords and ladies were able to start levying taxes for commercial brewers, since it was in their best interest to have a steady supply of alcohol as it was integral to the social order. By about 1600, beer brewing was one of the leading trades in towns and cities. As always seems to be the case, London represented the main bulk of the trade, though traditional brewing could be found in small, local settlements.
So, that’s a little bit of our coverage on the considered highlights of brewing in the medieval period. While drinking in the pub is an activity that has certainly been disrupted by recent events, it can definitely be said that the making and drinking of alcohol is a long-established human practice that will continue for many years to come. Cheers!