The wine industry in ancient Egypt

The word (wine) is usually expressed in terms of the fermented juice of fresh grapes, and wine in this sense was the most important wine for the ancient Egyptians. However, they also had other wines such as palm wine and date wine and an additional type made from the fruit of the tailor; according to Pliny, the Romans wine sometimes in the Late Period, and Tire Egyptians also made wine. It seems that it was one of the favourite drinks, and the clear views of this industry are a scene in the cemetery of “Ptahhotep.”

This was done when many men would gather large clusters of grapes in baskets and carry them on their backs to the place of the afternoon. There they empty them into large containers that are not deep, and we do not know whether they are wood or stone, then they trample the grapes with their feet, and five or six men do so together To the beat of the music.

Types of wines in ancient Egypt

1- grape wine: –

Wine is often referred to in ancient Egyptian texts referring to grape wine, and scenes of vine harvesting often appear on the walls of tombs in which grape harvesting and trampling, squeezing, or all of these processes occur, and in examples of this is a tomb from the era of the Fifth Dynasty in Saqqara. And another from the reign of the Sixth Dynasty, also in it, and the third from the reign of the Twelfth Dynasty in Al-Barsha. And several tombs from this era are also in Bani Hassan.

Date wine (ethnic): –

Date fruits were always of special value to the ancient Egyptians, and they extracted from it a type of date wine that they call in Upper Egypt (customary). It is famous for its manufacture to this day in some Qena governorate countries such as Naqada, and it is used in medicinal drugs, especially in laxatives, as it is used as a drink.

Palm wine

It consisted of palm tree sap and obtained this sap by making a notch in the tree’s embers directly under the base of its upper branches. Upon taking it from the palm, the liquids would not be intoxicating, but it acquired this characteristic by fermentation when it was kept.

Al-Mukha fruit wine: –

As for the wine of the tailor, there is no reference to it except what Pliny mentioned was that it was made in Egypt. The Cordia myxa tree, grown in gardens in Egypt, produces sticky fruit that Theophrastus called “the Egyptian plum” and describes it without indicating any use in winemaking.