When Did Humans First Drink Alcohol?

#ancientalcohol #humanevolution #ancienthistory When Did Humans First Drink Alcohol? Humans have been pouring drinks for a very long time, but nobody knows exactly when it began. When did ancient humans start drinking alcohol, and was it ever something we invented at all? This video follows the chemical trail left in clay jars, stone bowls, and our own genes. In this video: We look at why many people assume alcohol arrived with farming, villages, and writing. We examine jar residue from Iran, Armenia, and Georgia that points to beer and wine thousands of years ago. We visit Jiahu in China, where researchers found signs of a drink made from rice, honey, and fruit. We explore Göbekli Tepe in Turkey and the debate over whether its stone vats were used for brewing. We return to Raqefet Cave in Israel, where researchers found evidence of a beer-like drink about 13,000 years ago. We ask where alcohol comes from before anyone makes it, from yeast on ripe fruit to the drunken monkey hypothesis. We cover a study suggesting our ancestors could break down alcohol roughly ten million years ago. The story is surprising because the further back the evidence goes, the less alcohol looks like an invention. Pottery only preserves part of the record, so the oldest traces we can detect may not be the oldest drinks that existed. Researchers still debate why people began making alcohol on purpose, from feasts and funerals to nutrition and simple enjoyment. This video lays out what the evidence supports, where it is uncertain, and why the real beginning may be hidden. Business Inquiries: 2dexplain1122@gmail.com COPYRIGHT NOTICE: All images and visuals used in this video are AI-generated and carry no third-party copyright. This content is created for educational purposes. Contact us for any queries. SOURCE: Liu, L., Wang, J., Rosenberg, D., Zhao, H., Lengyel, G., Nadel, D. (2018). "Fermented beverage production by hunter-gatherers 13,000 years ago." Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports. (Raqefet Cave, Natufians) McGovern, P. E. et al. (2004). "Fermented beverages of pre- and proto-historic China." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (Jiahu) McGovern, P. E. et al. (2017). "Early Neolithic wine of Georgia in the South Caucasus." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (Gadachrili Gora, Shulaveris Gora) McGovern, P. E. et al. (1996). Hajji Firuz Tepe resinated wine analysis. Antiquity. Michel, R. H., McGovern, P. E., Badler, V. R. (1992). "Chemical evidence for ancient beer." Nature. (Godin Tepe) Barnard, H. et al. (2011). "Chemical evidence for wine production around 4000 BCE in the Late Chalcolithic Near Eastern highlands." Journal of Archaeological Science. (Areni-1) Dietrich, O. et al. (2012). "The role of cult and feasting in the emergence of Neolithic communities: new evidence from Göbekli Tepe." Antiquity. Carrigan, M. A. et al. (2015). "Hominids adapted to metabolize ethanol long before human-directed fermentation." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (ADH4) Dudley, R. (2000). "Evolutionary origins of human alcoholism in primate frugivory." The Quarterly Review of Biology. (Drunken monkey hypothesis) Wiens, F. et al. (2008). "Chronic intake of fermented floral nectar by wild treeshrews." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Hockings, K. J. et al. (2015). "Tools to tipple: ethanol ingestion by wild chimpanzees using leaf-sponges." Royal Society Open Science. Hayden, B. (2014). The Power of Feasts: From Prehistory to the Present. Cambridge University Press. Braidwood, R. J. et al. (1953). "Symposium: Did man once live by beer alone?" American Anthropologist. #raqefetcave #gobeklitepe #fermentation #archaeology