{"id":7213,"date":"2016-08-11T10:00:58","date_gmt":"2016-08-11T14:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/?p=7213"},"modified":"2016-07-12T16:33:30","modified_gmt":"2016-07-12T20:33:30","slug":"secret-life-of-beer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/2016\/08\/11\/secret-life-of-beer\/","title":{"rendered":"Pict Ale"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Img0018\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items recently cataloged from the\u00a0Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n

\"Img0019\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

As the title suggests this is an entertaining read on the history, legends, and facts regarding beer along with clever illustrations.\u00a0 The self-proclaimed “beer king” Alan Eames covers everything from the invention of beer, drinking habits of various cultures, advice on the best suds in the world, as well as the representation of beer in poetry, song, and popular culture.<\/p>\n

I was fascinated to discover within the text something called Pict ale, which according to the author was the first beer brewed in the British Isles and famous for its strength and hallucinogenic potency.\u00a0 It has been subsequently discovered that dwelling beneath the leaves of the heather plant is ergot fungus<\/em> which contains LSD-like properties.\u00a0 Heather ale was made using the flowers of the heather plant which were placed in the bottom of brew vats and combined with malt.\u00a0 The specific type of heather was a closely guarded secret kept by the Picts, which was eventually lost when they were exterminated by the Scottish King Niall in the fourth century. \u00a0Heather ale has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years and is currently produced by a small number of Scottish breweries.<\/p>\n

\"FraochFraoch<\/a> is one of those contemporary heather ales that is brewed by the Williams Bros. Brewing Company<\/a> in Scotland.\u00a0 They suggest pairing this original craft beer with venison, haggis, or dessert.<\/p>\n

Robert Louis Stevenson famously wrote about the heather ale\u00a0and its connection to the Picts in his publication of Ballads<\/a> in 1890. \u00a0Houghton has a copy that was once owned by Henry James and includes\u00a0Heather ale: a Galloway legend<\/em>\u00a0where he writes:<\/p>\n

“Was far sweeter than honey,\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Was stronger far than wine.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"heatherale_2\"<\/a>Another section on beer, poetry, and song reveals that the Middles Ages had many songs written both about the joys and evils of beer. \u00a0European history shows that the control and taxation of beer resulted in some of the earliest satiric music. \u00a0This\u00a0musical outrage commonly burst forth in response to\u00a0the increased price of beer revealing the importance of beer with the general populace. \u00a0To learn more from this handy little volume you can find the <\/span>Secret life of beer :\u00a0legends, lore & little-known facts<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span>[compiled by] Alan D. Eames.\u00a0Pownal, Vt. : Storey Communications, c1995 in Widener’s collection. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Thanks to Alison Harris, Santo Domingo Project Manager, for contributing this post.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post is part of an ongoing series featuring items recently cataloged from the\u00a0Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection. As the title suggests this is an entertaining read on the history, legends, and facts regarding beer along with clever illustrations.\u00a0 The self-proclaimed “beer king” Alan Eames covers everything from the invention of beer, drinking habits of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4490,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[72741],"tags":[159393,1913,159390,72720,873,159391,61606],"class_list":["post-7213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-widener-library","tag-alan-eames","tag-beer","tag-heather-ale","tag-julio-mario-santo-domingo-collection","tag-poetry","tag-robert-louis-stevenson","tag-song"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5TUly-1Sl","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4490"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7213"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7492,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7213\/revisions\/7492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}