Palynological evidence of mead: a prehistoric drink dating back to the 3rd millennium B.C

• Published in: Vegetation history and archaeobotany 2014-09, Vol.23 (5), p.515-526
• Main Authors: Moe, Dagfinn, Oeggl, Klaus
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Alcohol drinking; Anthropology; Archaeology; Biogeosciences; Bronze age; Climate Change; Diet; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Environmental studies; Europe; Filipendula ulmaria; Flora; Flowers; Honey; humans; Insects; Interdisciplinary studies; Iron age; mead; Methodology and general studies; Nectar; Original Article; Paleontology; Palynology; Plants; Pollen; Prehistory and protohistory; Salt mining; Taxa
• ISSN: 0939-6314; 1617-6278
• DOI: 10.1007/s00334-013-0419-x

Human coprolites from Birka, Sweden and Dürrnberg, Austria, have been found, dated and palynologically analysed as a part of interdisciplinary studies. All their pollen spectra are dominated by insect-pollinated taxa well-known as nectar producing flowers, suggesting some consumption of honey. Among those spectra, some show significantly high values of Filipendula ulmaria (meadowsweet) pollen, which was historically used as flavouring in mead production, and which together with other indicators for honey, suggest that mead was part of the historic and prehistoric diet both in Birka and Dürrnberg. An evaluation of the background pollen suggests for the Birka specimen that honey was imported to the site from southern Baltic areas. The use of mead based on written sources is known at least from the Roman period. Archaeological studies demonstrate mead as an old crust residue on the inside of pots and other earthenware used as important funeral gifts from at least the 27th–25th centuries B.C. in Georgia. A comparison of the pollen records of European honey/mead samples strongly suggests that Filipendula is indicative of mead.