Obviously they need something to wash down their 40 potatoes a day. I also find the amount questionable, as I suspect that our modern expectations of what that

Obviously they need something to wash down their 40 potatoes a day. I also find the amount questionable, as I suspect that our modern expectations of what that means and the details of what they meant when they recorded personal consumption means there's something lost in translation here. Even when I was outside scouting crops 10-12 hours a day on foot in southwest kansas with peak 110F temps, I'd still not need to drink more than 4 liters of water a day. I could push it up another liter, but it wasn't needed and could actually be harmful if one overhydrates. And that's the extreme of the year, way more what I'd reach for most of the year. Whereas the daily motto of the fuckers was apparently "I am a machine that turns beer into piss"