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https://history.howstuffworks.com/medieval-people-drink-beer-water.htm https://history.howstuffworks.com/medieval-people-drink-beer... https://gizmodo.com/no-m
by tgv 3y ago
https://history.howstuffworks.com/medieval-people-drink-beer-water.htm https://history.howstuffworks.com/medieval-people-drink-beer...
https://gizmodo.com/no-medieval-people-didnt-drink-booze-to-avoid-dirty-w-1533442326 https://gizmodo.com/no-medieval-people-didnt-drink-booze-to-...
No idea what the concensus is, but it also doesn't make sense that everyone drank beer instead of water. Young children almost certainly didn't drink beer. And I expect it to have been out of reach for large parts of the population: cost and availability of ingredients.
- OfSanguineFire 3y agoI specifically said small beer, and that is something that has been commonly served to children in various places even into modern times. Your claim that beer was too costly also seems to be based on how beer is made and sold today: back then, beer was made without hops, and grain was available to medieval peasants because they were growing it themselves. A sort of beer was drunk by the working classes in Ancient Egypt, it has never been an elite drink.
- User23 3y agoMany people don’t realize that yeast leavened bread is about 1% alcohol and as high as 2%. Obviously we let children eat it. Why would small beer at the same percentage be a problem?
- elcomet 3y agoAlcohol evaporates when the bread cooks
- jameshart 3y agoSeems like the consensus is that some remains. A lot of online sources cite a 1926 study that said bread can have ‘up to 1.9%’ alcohol content. This more recent study from 1998 suggests that 0.4-0.6% ethanol by mass is more typical: https://auventdunord.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/food-alcohol-content.pdf https://auventdunord.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/food-alco...
- User23 3y agoSome of it, but not all of it or even the majority[1]. For reference some breads bake in as little as 20 minutes so a fair bit of alcohol remains. [1] https://www.isu.edu/news/2019-fall/no-worries-the-alcohol-burns-off-during-cookingbut-does-it-really.html https://www.isu.edu/news/2019-fall/no-worries-the-alcohol-bu...
- groestl 3y agoAnd a very ripe banana can have an ABV value of 0.4%.
- rsynnott 3y agoAIUI consensus is that people did drink water but also quite a lot of beer. "Young children almost certainly didn't drink beer." - wanna bet? > In his A Plan for the Conduct of Female Education, in Boarding Schools published 1797, writer Erasmus Darwin agreed that "For the drink of the more robust children water is preferable, and for the weaker ones, small beer ..."
- mewpmewp2 3y agoTo be honest if you are unaware of the bad effects of beer or how addiction works in general, it seems like a thing that you would get so easily addicted to. If I had a different knowledge set and easy access to beer, perhaps I would just drink it daily. Without water I imagine there are going to be massive hangovers though.
- 7thaccount 3y agoI assume these beers were pretty low ABV. Addiction to alcohol probably was pretty common and perhaps preferable to dysentery.
- 878654Tom 3y agoYes, this is called Small Beer or Table Beer in Belgium. It goes as low as 1% and was very normal in schools and at homes before clean water was a common thing. It still is a very popular beer to drink while you eat but children don't consume it anymore. My father did tell me that when he was younger (1970-1980) they still drank it at the table in his school.
- kwhitefoot 3y agoI don't know when the rules changed but when I was a child in England in the sixties anything less than 2% could be sold to anyone, it wasn't regarded as properly alcoholic. The brand I remember is Top Deck Shandy, half and half lemonade and light beer.
- 3y ago
- VoodooJuJu 3y agoYoung children did drink it, and it's still served to children today in Finland: https://www.brewingnordic.com/farmhouse-ales/small-beer-called-kalja/ https://www.brewingnordic.com/farmhouse-ales/small-beer-call...
- mewpmewp2 3y agoI somewhat remember my parents offering me a drink to try out when I was 6 or 7. Not sure if it's a made up hint of memory. It definitely wasn't something frequent or high dosage though. I actively started drinking with peers around the age of 12 - 14. That was in secrecy from parents though, asking homeless to buy us the goods.
- gostsamo 3y agoMy parents definitely offered me alcohol when I was a child. The hard alcohol was mostly to show me how it burns the throat and not to try it, while beer was bitter but okay for a sip or two to feel grownup. Alcohol also had a medicinal use in the family, though I'm not sure about the medicinal effect. After I was 14 and more, alcohol was introduced on more regular bases, but not with social pressure to drink, just was available as an option. Decades later, I'm just a social drinker.
- kwhitefoot 3y agoI had essentially the same experience. I'm 67 now. My grandmother used to give me a miniature of De Kuyper's Cherry Brandy for Christmas from when I was six or seven, I made it last until after New Year!
- tokai 3y agoWhat a peak HN comment - authoritative and wrong. Kids most definitely did drink alcohol. https://web.archive.org/web/20110306073320/http://digital.library.adelaide.edu.au/theses/09AR/09ara431.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20110306073320/http://digital.li...
- tengbretson 3y agoWhat was the authoritative part?
- beastman82 3y agoThis. The irony is too much
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- OfSanguineFire 3y agoI assume the GP was chuckling at how the OP offered two authoritative (well, not really) links to support a claim in my top-level post, but then went on to make an erroneous claim himself.
- tokai 3y agoNo not at all. Its is true and well documented claim that people didn't drink alcohol at all times instead of water. The links and what he is claiming is not overlapping.
- tokai 3y ago>certainly didn't drink beer >out of reach for large parts of the population Claims that the poster base on nothing at all, but still claim it in a peremptory fashion.
- tengbretson 3y ago
- CalRobert 3y agoAnd yet there are people alive today who enjoyed a glass of wine as a schoolchild in France. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/french-children-wine-at-school/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/french-children-wine-at-sc...