Η παρασκευή αλκοόλης από μέλι, έγινε πριν από 40.000 χρόνια!

Του Γιώργου Λεκάκη

Το 2012, οι αρχαιολόγοι στην Νότιο Αφρική βρήκαν ένα κομμάτι μελισσοκηρού (κερί μέλισσας), μαζί με άλλα συστατικά, που πιθανώς χρησιμοποιήθηκαν για την παραγωγή αλκοόλης, υποδεικνύοντας ότι οι κυνηγοί-τροφοσυλλέκτες πειραματίστηκαν με την παρασκευή αλκοόλης από μέλι, ήδη πριν από 40.000 χρόνια…

Το εύρημα περιείχε επίσης, ίχνη πρωτεϊνικής ουσίας, πιθανώς αυγού, και ρητίνης δένδρου (ρετσίνι) - μια συνταγή που χάθηκε στον χρόνο… Αυτός ο πιθανός πρόγονος ενός τύπου υδρομελιού, που εξακολουθεί να κατασκευάζεται σήμερα από τους νομαδικούς λαούς της Νότιας Αφρικής, ίσως ήταν ανάμεσα σε μια ποικιλία νέων τροφίμων και τεχνολογιών, που παρήχθησαν κατά την Παλαιολιθική περίοδο…

Τώρα εάν αναλογιστούμε αυτά που μας παρέδωσαν οι πρόγονοί μας, πως ο Αρισταίος εφηύρε την μελισσοκομία, τότε έχουμε ένα χρονικό όριο για το πότε αυτός έζησε και δίδαξε: Πριν τουλάχιστον 40.000 χρόνια… Θυμίζω πως ο Αρισταίος ήταν εκ των πρώτων Ελλήνων οικιστών της Αφρικής – αυτός ίδρυσε και ονομάτισε την Κυρήνη…

Τέλος, σημειώνω, πως το υδρόμελο ήταν γνωστό στους αρχαίους Έλληνες ...

Έχω πει, και έχω γράψει πολλάκις, πως η Ελληνική Μυθολογία είναι Ιστορία που αφορά την Παλαιολιθική, και όχι την Νεολιθική περίοδο...

ΠΗΓΗ: Francesco d’Errico, Lucinda Backwell, Paola Villa, Ilaria Degano, Jeannette J. Lucejko, Marion K. Bamford, Thomas F. G. Higham, Maria Perla Colombini, and Peter B. Beaumont «Early evidence of San material culturerepresented by organic artifacts from Border Cave, South Africa», στο PNAS, 14.8.2012, 109 (33) 13214-13219, DOI, edited by Richard G. Klein, Stanford University, Stanford, CA.

Neil Rusch «Honey Bees and Alcohol: Tracing Fermentation Practices andBee Knowledge in Africa», στο Journal Bee World, Volume 96, 2019 - Issue 4, σελ. 117-119, 6.9.2019.

Archaeology, "Alcohol Through the Ages", Νοέμβρ.-Δεκ. 2020. ΑΡΧΕΙΟΝ ΠΟΛΙΤΙΣΜΟΥ, 14.10.2020.

Alcohol Through the Ages

The happy accident of biting into a piece of fruit or sipping liquid imbued with the intoxicating properties imparted by fermentation must have beguiled innumerable early humans and their ancestors. At what point, however, did they first seek to control the process of alcoholic fermentation? A lump of beeswax wrapped in plant material and tied with twine discovered in South Africa’s Border Cave in 2012 suggests that early hunter-gatherers may have been making a type of honey-based alcohol there as long as 40,000 years ago. The bundle also contained traces of a protein substance, possibly egg, and tree resin - a recipe lost to time. This possible progenitor of a type of mead that is still made by the nomadic San peoples of South Africa may have been among a variety of new foods and technologies produced during the Paleolithic period.

Early evidence of San material culture represented by organic artifacts from Border Cave, South Africa 

Recent archaeological discoveries have revealed that pigment use, beads, engravings, and sophisticated stone and bone tools were already present in southern Africa 75,000 y ago. Many of these artifacts disappeared by 60,000 y ago, suggesting that modern behavior appeared in the past and was subsequently lost before becoming firmly established. Most archaeologists think that San hunter–gatherer cultural adaptation emerged 20,000 y ago. However, reanalysis of organic artifacts from Border Cave, South Africa, shows that the Early Later Stone Age inhabitants of this cave used notched bones for notational purposes, wooden digging sticks, bone awls, and bone points similar to those used by San as arrowheads. A point is decorated with a spiral groove filled with red ochre, which closely parallels similar marks that San make to identify their arrowheads when hunting. A mixture of beeswax, Euphorbia resin, and possibly egg, wrapped in vegetal fibers, dated to ∼40,000 BP, may have been used for hafting. Ornaments include marine shell beads and ostrich eggshell beads, directly dated to ∼42,000 BP. A digging stick, dated to ∼39,000 BP, is made of Flueggea virosa. A wooden poison applicator, dated to ∼24,000 BP, retains residues with ricinoleic acid, derived from poisonous castor beans. Reappraisal of radiocarbon age estimates through Bayesian modeling, and the identification of key elements of San material culture at Border Cave, places the emergence of modern hunter–gatherer adaptation, as we know it, to ∼44,000 y ago.

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