A History of the World in Six Glasses Timeline

Beer

9000 BCE

People began cultivating barley and wheat in the Fertile Crescent for the first time to make beer.

Beer

6000 BCE

Pottery was invented which was used to brew beer in although beer could be brewed in pitch-lined baskets, leather bags or animal stomachs, hollowed-out trees, large shells, or stone vessels before pottery was invented.

Beer

5000 BCE

Farming began to spread throughout the Fertile Crescent because more plant and animals were being domestication and new irrigation techniques made farming possible in more places.

Beer

4000 BCE

Beer was widespread in eastern Mesopotamia and this is proved when it appeared in a pictogram from Mesopotamia.

Wine

3150 BCE

King Scorpion I was buried with seven hundred jars of wine which was imported from the southern Levant, a significant wine producing area at the time.

Tea

2737 BCE

According to Chinese tradition, the first cup of tea was brewed by the emperor Shen Nun, China's second legendary emperor.

Beer

2700 BCE

Beer drinking was seen as a hallmark of civilization by the Mesopotamians and this is shown in the Epic of Gilgamesh when Enkidu drank beer and ate the food he was given which resulted in him becoming a human.

Wine

2500 BCE

Vines were being cultivated in Crete and possibly mainland Greece to make wine.

Wine

424 BCE

During the Peloponnesian war, spartan troops arrived at Acanthus which was a wine producing city that was allied with Athens. The locals were scared of loosing their grapes so they decided to change allegiances.

Wine

70

Roman writer Pliny the Elder estimated that there were eighty different noteworthy types of wine in the Roman world. Two thirds of it was grown in Italy.

Wine

146

The Italian peninsula became the world's foremost wine producing region because wine was the only product being exported in it.

Tea

618

In China, tea became the national beverage during the Tang dynasty and people began deliberately cultivating tea instead of harvesting the leaves from wild bushes.

Tea

1191

A Buddhist monk named Eisai brought the latest Chinese knowledge about the growing, picking, preparation, and drinking of tea. Eisai also wrote a book about the health benefits of tea.

Spirits

1300

Arnald of Villanova made instructions for distilling wine who believed in its therapeutic power.

Spirits

1386

Charles II of Navarre was suffering from paralysis and a fever. His doctors decided to distill wine which was said to have miraculous healing powers.

Spirits

1400

The process of distillation began to spread thanks to the invention of the printing press.

Coffee

1470

Coffee had been adopted by Sufis who used it to stay awake during late night religious ceremonies where the participants reached out to God through repetitive chanting and swaying.

Spirits

1478

The first printed book about distillation was published in Augsburg and it was written by Michael Puff Von Schrick.

Spirits

1496

Distilling wine in your own home was banned in the German city of Nuremberg because too many people were drinking too much.

Coffee

1511

Many Muslim scholars claimed coffee was intoxicating like alcoholic beverages are so they attempted to ban it in Mecca.

Tea

1610

A Dutch ship brought the first small commercial consignment of tea to Europe, where it was regarded as a novelty.

Tea

1650

Tea was enjoyed by the aristocracy for a short amount of time in France. They also drank tea with milk for the flavor and to reduce its temperature.

Coffee

1652

London's first coffeehouse was opened by Pasqua Rosee, the Armenian servant of an English merchant who acquired a taste for coffee while traveling in the Middle East.

Coffee

1671

France's first coffeehouse opened in Marseilles where doctors said coffee was bad for your health. Coffee still continued to spread even though this was said about it.

Coffee

1671

Sylvestre Dufour stated "Coffee sobers you up instantaneously" and the idea that coffee counteracts intoxication still remains today but there is little truth to it.

COCA-COLA

1772

Joseph Priestley published a book explaining how to make soda water.

COCA-COLA

1800

Soda water beverages were only used for medicinal purposes when doctors would prescribe them for various ailments but around this time they were not strictly medicinal.

COCA-COLA

1886

The first advertisement for COCA-COLA appeared in the Atlanta Journal. The drink had launched just in time for Atlanta's experiment with prohibition.

COCA-COLA

1887

John Pemberton had sold two-thirds of his coca-cola rights to two businessmen because he was unwell and wanted to raise some money.

COCA-COLA

1890

Sales of coca-cola quadrupled after Asa Candler got the rights to it. Candler decided to abandon his other products because they were not as popular as COCA-COLA.