776

At age thirty-nine, Persian alchemist and chemist Al Jabir (Abu Musa Jabir ibn Hayyan) invented the al-ambiq still as part of his laboratory equipment.

 

830

Muslim Arab philosopher, physician, and polymath Al-Kindi (801–873) distills a digestible elixir from an alembic still.

 

900

Persian polymath, philosopher, and physician Al-Razi (854–925) discovered many compounds and chemicals in his medicinal experimentations, including alcohol.

 

1000

The Moors (the name given to a large population of Arabs, Berber North Africans, and Muslim Europeans) introduced alembic distillation methods in France and Spain.

 

1144

Englishman and Arabic translator Robert of Chester translates the written works of distillation from Al-Jabir, Al-Kindi, and Al-Razi from Arab to Latin.

 

1192
Genoese merchants brought an India spirit called arrack to Russia.

 

1250

German friar and Catholic bishop Albertus Magnus (also known as Saint Albert the Great) documents his experiments in making aqua vitae.

 

1253

King Louis IX of France sent William de Rubruquis to convert the Tartars to Christianity. He becomes the first European traveler to mention koumis (distilled female horse milk) and arrack during his journey.

 

1269

German poet Jacob van Maerlant published twenty books in his lifetime, and Der Naturen Bloeme mentions juniper-based tonics and medicines.

 

1280

English philosopher and Franciscan friar Roger Bacon translated Al-Razi’s distillation process into Latin.

 

1292

While traveling home from Beijing to Italy, Venetian merchant Marco Polo discovers a spirit indigenous to Samara in Indonesia called “arrack,” made with sugar palm juice. He records the spirit in the second volume of The Travels of Marco Polo (II Milione in Italian).

 

1297

Philosopher and writer Ramon Llull explains the secrets of distillation to Britain’s King Edward II.

 

1310

Physician Arnaud de Ville-Neuve distills wine with an alembic still and coins the term “aqua vitae.”

 

1320

In 2008, The Red Book of Ossory (published in 1320) became the first book to be digitalized at the RCB Library in Dublin, Ireland—aqua vitae is documented in the book.

 

1404

A grain-based aqua vitae produced throughout Poland is mentioned in Poland’s Sandomierz Court Registry. 

 

1411

Armagnac goes into full-scale production in France.

 

1414

Armagnac is registered as a commercial product in Saint-Sever, France.

 

1426

Genoese merchants pass through Russia and give Vasily Vasiliyevich, the Grand Prince of Moscow (Vasily II the Blind), a bottle of their arrack. It’s believed that monasteries are ordered to produce a grain-based version called bread wine within a few years.

 

1455

Austrian-born and Viennese-trained physician Michael Puff von Schrick wrote A Very Useful Book on Distillations, which describes eighty-two herbal liquors. In 1466, it is printed and published. Even though Schrick died in 1473, the book went through thirty-eight editions from 1476–1601.

 

1478

Arnaud de Ville-Neuve’s Liber de Vinis (“Book of Wines”) is translated into English, printed, and published. The book contains recipes for making therapeutic wine using herbs, spices, metal compounds, syrups, and flavored spirits.

 

1493

A German physician in Nuremberg writes about kirshwasser, a cherry eau-de-vie made from Black Forest morello cherries: “Because everyone at present has got into the habit of drinking aqua vitae, it is necessary to remember the quantity that one can permit oneself to drink and learn to drink it according to one’s capacities, if one wishes to behave like a gentleman.”

 

1495

The first recorded mention of Scotch whisky is from a June 1 entry in the Exchequer Rolls of Scotland (accounting records). The entry says, “To Friar John Cor, by order of the King James IV, to make aqua vitae VIII bolls of malt.” Four years later, the Lord High Treasurer’s account recorded payment: “To the barbour that brought aqua vitae to the King in Dundee.”

 

1500

German surgeon and alchemist Hieronymous Brunschwig publishes Liber de arte distillandi: Das buch der rechten kunst zu distillieren (“The Book of the Art of Distillation”) in Strasbourg. This groundbreaking book inspires numerous Holland distilling houses to begin producing brandewijn (burnt wine) from malted grain.

 

1501

Others had tried, including Christopher Columbus, but Pedro de Atienza was the first to import sugarcane seedlings to Hispaniola successfully. He harvests his first crop four years later.

 

1505

Scotland’s King James IV granted the Guild of Surgeons and Barbers a monopoly to produce aqua vitae.

 

1510

Bénédictine monk Dom Bernardo Vincelli creates a herbal eau-de-vie at the Abbey of Fecamp. DOM Bénédictine is still sold today and used in popular cocktails such as the Singapore Sling, Vieux Carré, and Bobby Burns.

 

1514

One year before he died, King Louis XII of France licensed vinegar producers to distill eau-de-vie.

 

1531

In Santiago de Tequila, Mexico, Spanish settlers constructed alquitaras (stills) and distill pulque—a local fermented beverage made from the agave plant. They call the result mexcalli (mezcal).

 

1533

Martim Afonso de Sousa and four partners set up three confectioneries. They make a sugarcane wine into aguardiente de caña (sugarcane eau-de-vie)—later known as cachaça.

 

Fourteen-year-old Italian Caterina de’ Medici marries fourteen-year-old Henry, the second son of King Francis I of France. She brings bottles of Tuscany Liquore Mediceo, Fraticello, and Elixir Stomatico di Lunga Vita, made by monks in the mountains surrounding Florence.

 

1534

Polish pharmacist Stefan Falimirz publishes the lavishly illustrated book of medical treatments O Ziolach / O Mocy Ich (“On Herbs and Their Potency”), which is one of the first to document the word “vodka” and details the preparation of over seventy vodka-based medicines.

 

1537

King Francis I of France granted wholesale grocers a license to produce eau-de-vie.

 

1538

Spanish settlers in Peru began to harvest and export wine, and the non-suitable harvests were given to farmers who make what we know today as pisco.

 

1552

In the book Constelijck Distilleer Boek, Philippus Hermanni refers to a juniper-infused eau-de-vie.

 

1575

Lucas Bulsius moves to Amsterdam and sets up his distillery. He changes his family name to Bols and begins making jenever. Twenty-five years later, Bols became a preferred supplier to the Seventeen Gentlemen, the inner circle of the powerful Dutch East India Company. He gets first rights on cargo of herbs and spices, giving him an advantage.

 

1598

Spanish settlers began distilling aguardiente de caña (rum) from molasses.

 

1620

The Pilgrims brought brandy and gin with them to America on the Mayflower. In 1657, they began to import molasses from the Caribbean to open the first American distillery in Boston. In addition, by 1664, they built a second rum distillery in New York City. 

 

 

Fun Alcohol Facts

Slang terms for distilled alcohol include “aqua vitae,” “ardent spirits,” “belt,” “booze,” “firewater,” “giggle juice,” “grog,” “hard stuff,” “hooch” (refers to it being homemade), “John Barleycorn,” “liquid courage,” “moonshine” (made by the light of the moon), “nightcap,” “sauce,” “snort,” “swill,” “swish,” “tipple,” “toddy,” and tot.

 

In the United Kingdom, it is legal for children to drink at home with their parents from age six and up. They can be in a pub if accompanied by a parent and, at age sixteen, drink beer or wine in a pub with their parents.

 

Dr. David Kimball, the lead historian at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, found a 1787 farewell party bar tab at the City Tavern for George Washington in 1985. The bar tab showed that fifty-five attendees drank sixty bottles of claret, fifty-four bottles of Madeira, eight bottles of whiskey, twenty-two bottles of porter, eight bottles of hard cider, twelve bottles of beer, and seven bowls of alcoholic punch.

 

According to Wikipedia, the country that drinks the most alcohol globally is the Republic of Belarus, bordered by Russia, Poland, Ukraine, Latvia, and Lithuania. The country that drinks the most spirits is Haiti.

 

The youngest drinking age in the world is sixteen, and the oldest is twenty-five. There are twenty-three countries whose drinking age is sixteen years old (a couple include Cuba and Switzerland), and there are seven states in India where the drinking age is twenty-five. Alcohol is illegal in thirteen countries.

 

The alcohol-drinking habits of vervet monkeys were studied on St. Kitts island (the monkeys stole drinks from sunbathing tourists). They learned that the monkeys’ drinking behaviors were similar to humans’: teetotalers, social drinkers (the majority, who only drink with other monkeys), regular drinkers, and binge drinkers that will drink themselves into a coma or death.

 

Whiteclay, Nebraska, has a population of fourteen. They also have four liquor stores, and their yearly beer sales are $3 million (the county next to them is dry).

 

All Playboy bunnies working at Playboy Clubs were required to know 143 brands of liquor.

 

Make DIY ice packs with plain vodka, gin, rum, tequila, or whiskey. Pour 1 cup of water and 1 cup of spirit into a freezer plastic bag, squeeze out the air, and seal. Seal that bag into another bag, then place it in the freezer. Since the spirit will not freeze solid, it will create a flexible, slushy consistency.

 

Finding the proof of a spirit dates back to the 1500s. They discovered that if you soak a pellet of gunpowder in the spirit, the gunpowder could still burn; the spirits were rated above proof. In the 1800s, the gunpowder test was replaced by a specific gravity test.