Drinks of the world / by James Mew and John Ashton.

  • Mew, James.
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Drinks of the world / by James Mew and John Ashton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    to those of the murex. Stolberg (Travels, ix. 280) says he saw in a collection at Catania a little blue vase, believed to be a vas murrhinum. The modern jars in any of the wine districts of Italy, such as Asti Montepulciano or Montefiascone, thin earthen two-handled vessels holding some twenty quarts, are almost identical with the ancient amphora. Suetonius speaks of a candidate for the qusestorship who drank the contents of a whole amphora at a dinner given by Tiberius. This amphora was probably of a smaller size. Wooden vessels for wine seem to have been unfamiliar to the Greeks and Romans ; they, however, occasionally em- ployed glass. Bottles, vases, and cups of that material, which may be seen often enough now in collections of antiquities, show the great taste which in these and in other matters they possessed. A few of these are given to illustrate our text. Skins of animals, ren- dered impervious by oil or resinous gums, were probably the most ancient receptacles for wine after it was taken from the vat. To these there are fre- quent allusions in Homer and Isaiah. Vessels of clay, with a coating of pitch, were introduced subsequently.