(#3) The Pharaohs Used Wine to Seem Like Crazy Powerful Gods
If you were rich and lived in Egypt back around 1,500 BC, then you drank wine. If you weren't, you didn't. It's as simple as that. Pharaohs drank wine and offered it to the gods, and even had wine buried with them from multiple wineries (yes, they had multiple wineries). Given that Egypt was a slave-loving country, the use of wine as a means of status kept the rich on top and the poor on the bottom, where they only drank beer.(#9) Wine Made the Scots and the French Best Friends - And Snubbed England
Around 1295, England was getting a little too big for its britches, and it was making people kind of nervous. In particular, France and Scotland were really focusing on trying to keep England from getting any bigger. So, in order to stop them, the two countries formed a treaty called the Auld Alliance. The Scots, however, got an added benefit of having first pick of all the best French wines, leaving England with a lesser selection. So, in its most basic form, the Scots' love of wine is what kept England from becoming a crazy powerhouse, and kept France strong, too.(#15) Rasputin Drank Poisoned Wine, but Survived to Be Horrifically Butchered Instead
Rasputin was known as a mystic and an amazing lover, particularly by the wife of the Czar at the time. Playing around with the Czar's wife also earned him a lot of enemies, and they set out to kill him. The first thing they tried was poisoning his wine with a dose of poison large enough to kill five men. It could have ended there, but apparently he really, really liked wine, and swallowed it down with no ill effects. From there, it just gets grisly: determined to kill him, his enemies shot him numerous times (with no luck), cut off his penis, wrapped him in a rug, threw him in a river, buried him, dug him up, and eventually burned his remains.(#2) Wine Determined Whether or Not the Greeks Thought You Were Civilized
If the ancient Greeks thought you were cool, chances are, you really were. And the best way to get those Greeks to like you? Why, give them wine, of course! You see, the ancient Greeks believed that creating wine was a fine art, so much so that they had a god that was focused on drinking it. If you could create wine, the Greeks would consider you civilized rather than backwards and barbarous, at least according to Thucydides, and many alliances were formed when the Greeks respected other "civilized" societies. In short, the ancient world looked the way it did because the Greeks respected other winemakers.(#12) Everyone Drank Wine as They Signed the Constitution
Most Americans know that the Constitution was signed in 1787, but most don't know that the place was overflowing with wine. You see, most of our founding fathers were huge wine lovers, to the point where, during the convention, Franklin had people follow him around to make sure he didn't go into any taverns and get drunk! But when the time came to sign, it went from a mellow affair to a real party. And the wine served? Not surprisingly, Franklin's favorite, Madeira. There's actually still a wine festival every year to celebrate the role wine played in this famous signing.(#13) Wine Helped Beethoven Create His Music - and Then Promptly Killed Him
This famous deaf musician lived a fairly short but very productive life. In his time, he wrote nine symphonies, 32 piano sonatas, one opera, five piano concertos, and many chamber works. And he did it all while tipping back a glass or two of wine. That's right, this drink that has been shown to make you more creative helped inspire Beethoven to create some of the most beautiful and memorable music known today. However, it's also what killed him. At age 56, he died with a slew of health problems plaguing him. Autopsies did show that one of these contributing factors was severe liver cirrhosis, brought on most likely by the sheer volume of wine he was drinking near the end of his life.
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Wine has the same long history as human civilization and maybe even older because when we discovered wine, it already existed in ancient social life. Wine has different advantages and functions, corresponding wine stories can be found in ancient Roman, Greek, and Chinese history. WIts production, storage, and trade are all driving the development of civilization and changing the way of life.
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