Ancient Elixir: How Beer Became the Unexpected Key to the Wari Empire’s 500-Year Reign
“It was like a microbrewery in some respects,” said Williams. “It was a production house, but the brewhouses and taverns would have been right next door.”
Wikimedia CommonsChicha is still made by South America’s indigenous population today and is sold as an alcoholic beverage in bars and restaurants.
Regular festivals and beer-laden social gatherings were an ingrained part of Wari society. The study suggests that up to 200 local political figures would attend these events at which chicha was consumed from three-foot-tall vessels adorned with Wari gods and leaders.
“People would have come into this site, in these festive moments, in order to recreate and reaffirm their affiliation with these Wari lords and maybe bring tribute and pledge loyalty to the Wari state,” said Williams.
The fact that chicha had such a short half-life and wasn’t shipped away was likely a vital factor in bringing the people to one, centralized locale. With the satisfaction of alcohol consumption and communal interaction, the study’s central claim that this brewing practice was beneficial for long-standing stability isn’t entirely unfounded.
By analyzing the ceramic vessels themselves, Williams and his team also discovered how chicha was brewed in the days of yore.
Scientists shot a laser at a shard of a beer vessel, which safely removed a small bit of material without jeopardizing the entire item, and then heated said material to dust in order to separate the molecules of which it consisted. This revealed what atomic elements, and how many, comprised the sample.
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