The favorite beverage of Pharaoh Tutankhamun was red wine. Analysis of the remaining wine residues in the emperor’s tomb has confirmed this.
Researcher Maria Rosa Guasch-Jane has developed a process to help archaeologists identify the color of ancient wines.
Guasch-Jane also discovered that the most valuable beverage in ancient Egypt, shedeh, was made from red grapes.
Bottles of wine from the time of King Tutankhamun were labeled with the product name, harvest year, origin, and the name of the grape grower, but did not disclose the wine’s color, according to Guasch-Jane.
The color of King Tut’s wine could not be determined until Guasch-Jane designed a method to identify a color compound absent in white wine, known as syringic acid. To test her method, Guasch-Jane scraped residues from wine jars taken from the British Museum and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Two of the jars were from King Tut’s tomb, discovered in 1922.
According to American archaeologist Patrick McGovern, wine was first produced around 5,400 BC. He discovered the first residue of grapes in Iran in 1994.
Wine did not originate in Egypt. Scientists believe that the first wine discovered in Egypt, in the tomb of King Scorpion around 3125 BC, was produced in Jordan and transported 800 kilometers by donkey and boat to Egypt. Only later was grape cultivation established in Egypt.
Research indicates that ancient Egyptian kings and royal family members regularly consumed wine, while commoners drank it only on special occasions or during festivals. Wine was also offered to the gods during ceremonies, and kings were buried with jars of wine and foods they enjoyed in life.
M.T