Friday 4 November 2011

Experimental Drinkology.

Experimental Archaeology is cool. About as cool as the Internet, I would say - there are so many questions about our history still unanswered, and quite a few of them are suitable for designing an archaeological experiment around them.

Plus it's absolutely exhilarating to try out things and find out things at the same time - even if the trying out and finding out involves lengthy mind-numbing and tedious work. (It's a scientific method, after all - you don't get only the fun of doing, you get the work of analysing too.)

And then, impressive things can happen. Plus a successful archaeological experiment is almost always of interest for the public - so it also helps getting people understand how varied and interesting and yet unknown the past is. Case in point? This article here, exploring old alcoholic beverages reconstructed from organic residue in vessels.

Here's to archaeology - cheers!

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