In this episode, we will see how the Romans took the Greeks’ drinking culture and remade it as their own. Unlike their Hellenistic counterparts, however, the Romans proved to be a bit more rambunctious when it came to their love of wine. And as we will see, some Romans even built (and destroyed) their reputations by it. Tune in to hear a little bit about Roman drinking games, just how much wine the average Roman drank in the past, and how the infamous Mark Antony became one of ancient Rome's most famous drunkards.

Sources:

Plutarch, The Parallel Lives, Loeb Classical Library edition (1920).

Michael Beer, “The de sua ebrietate of Marcus Antonius: an attempt to please everyone?” Paper draft accessed via Academia.edu.

Mark Humphries, “The Lexicon of Abuse: Drunkenness and Political Illegitimacy in the Late Roman World,” in Humour, History and Politics in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, edited by Guy Halsall (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002).

Karen Lyon, “The Four Humors: Eating in the Renaissance,” Folger Shakespeare Library (December 4, 2015).

Damien Martin, “When to Say When: Wine and Drunkenness in Roman Society,” Master’s Thesis, University of Missouri (May 2010).

Daniel E. Mortensen, “Wine, Drunkenness, and the Rhetoric of Crisis in Ancient Rome,” doctoral thesis, University of Wisconsin-Madison (1999).

Tom Stevenson and Marcus Wilson, eds., Cicero’s Philippics: History, Rhetoric, Ideology (2008).

Steve Thompson, “‘Daimon Drink’: Ancient Greek and Roman Explanations for Drunkenness,” (January, 2010).

Written and recorded by: Kenyon Payne

Theme music: "Southern Gothic" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Additional featured music:

“In Horto,” theromancrow

“Italian Traditional Music,” BackgroundMusicforVideos

“Tarentelle,” jumpingbunny

“MMM - Ominous,” Nion_Official

“Italianized,” Andreas-Woll-Music

“tempete en mer,” Jean-Paul-V

“gladiateurs vers la fin du combat,” Jean-Paul-V

“Quirky Fun Comedy,” NikitaKondrashev

“The Roman Army,” TheFealdoProject

“Utululu,” 33nano

“Lid,” anrocomposer

“Pyramids Theme Background Song,” SHERIF-KASSEM

“The It Middle Eastern Dance,” 9JackJack8

“Dark Ambient Emotions Music,” DeusLower

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, we are raising a glass to drinking in the Mediterranean world. From Athenian drinking parties, to the god of wine himself, let’s explore what it was like getting drunk on wine in ancient Greece.

Written and recorded by: Kenyon Payne

Theme music: "Southern Gothic" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Additional featured music:

“Traditional Greek Music,” ckotty3

“Ancient Legend,” SergePavkinMusic

“The Delphic Oracle,” VictoryOlympiaDay

“The Hermit,” HarumachiMusic

“Labyrinth,” VictoryOlympiaDay

“Historical Battle,” Oleksii_Kalyna

“pilgrimage -ancient, mediaeval harp,” HarumachiMusic

“The Duke of Steamtown,” UniqueCreativeAudio

“Halloween Thunder,” Abydos_Music

“Dramatic Hip-Hop,” White_Records

“Bloodlust,” Nightcast

D´vil, anrocomposer

Sources:

Nicholas R. Baima, “On the Value of Drunkenness in the Laws” History of Philosophy & Logical Analysis 20 (1), 2017.

Elizabeth Belfiore, “Wint and Catharsis of the Emotions in Plato’s Laws,” The Classical Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 2 (December 1986): 421-437.

Simon Denison, “Was Alexander a Great Alcoholic?” Independent (August 2, 1992).

N.S. Gill, “The Story of Semele, as Told by Nemesis” ThoughtCo, February 6, 2019.

Ross S. Kraemer, “Ecstacy and Possession: The Attraction of Women to the Cult of Dionysus” The Harvard Theological Review 72, No. ½ (Jan.-April 1979): pp. 55-80.

J.A. Liappas, J. Lascaratos, S. Fafouti, and G.N. Christodoulou, “Alexander the Great’s Relationship with Alcohol” Society for the Study of Addiction to Alcohol and Other Drugs, Addiction, 98 (5), May 2003.

Jessica Mellenthin and Susan O. Shapiro, Mythology Unbound: An Online Textbook for Classical Mythology, UEN Digital Press, open educational resource.

Max Nelson, “Regulation of Alcohol in Greco-Roman Antiquity,” The Social History of Alcohol and Drugs (2024).

C.D.C. Reeve, “Agalmata, Deontology, and the Erotics of Emptiness in the Symposium” Consecutio Rerum (October 31, 2017).

Tom Standage, A History of the World in Six Glasses (New York: Walker Publishing, 2005).

Transcripts available upon request. You can get in touch with the show at: ootepod@gmail.com.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Enjoy a bonus second episode this week to celebrate the launch of this show! Look for a new episode to drop every two weeks going forward.

Traveling to the Middle East, in the ancient region of Mesopotamia, we find the first emerging civilizations, as well as the first appearance of alcohol in writing. To the ancient Sumerians, beer was a magical, healthful drink delivered to them by the gods. Associated with prosperity, serenity, and most of the good things in life, there is one thing we can say for certain about this foundational civilization: they loved to drink beer.

In this episode we will raise a glass to the history of Sumerian beer and learn about the ancient beer gods, as well as what it meant to drink like an Egyptian.

Written and recorded by: Kenyon Payne

Theme music: "Southern Gothic" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Additional featured music:

“Cinematic Soundtrack - Ancient Egypt,” AntipodeanWriter

“Waves,” freesound_community

“ancient rhythm,” SamuelFJohanns

“Ukulele,” ArturAravidiMusic

“Quirky Fun Comedy,” leberchmus

“Ancient Life,” wildsound159

Sources:

Peter Damerow, “Sumerian Beer: The Origins of Brewing Technology in Ancient Mesopotamia,” Cuneiform Digital Library Journal, 2012.

Nora McGreevy, “Ancient People May Have Sipped Beer Through These 5,500-Year-Old Drinking Straws,” Smithsonian Magazine, January 21, 2022.

Joshua J. Mark, “Beer in Ancient Egypt,” World History Encyclopedia (March 16, 2017).

Tara Nurin, A Woman’s Place is in the Brewhouse (Chicago Review Press, 2021).

Tate Paulette, “Inebriation and the Early State: Beer and the Politics of Affect in Mesopotamia” Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, Vol. 63, September 2021.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.