There’s nothing like waking up after a boozy night out with a pounding headache only to realize that you lost something valuable along the night before. That’s a lesson a seventh century CE inhabitant of Yavne, Israel, seems to have learned the hard way. Archeologists excavating a Byzantine era site unearthed a valuable and remarkably beautiful gold and purple stoned ring from the environs of a large factory that produced white wine. Worst of all, scientists speculate that the ring was supposed to ward off the deleterious effects of over-imbibing, meaning that the unlucky owner was not just out of pocket, they were also out of ancient Advil.
The ring in question was discovered as part of the chance discovery of the ancient wine processing center. In a statement posted on the Israel Antiquities Association’s Facebook page, Dr. Elie Hadad, Liat Nadav-Ziv, and Dr. Jon Seligman, directors of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, said, “we were surprised to discover a massive factory here that produced wine in commercial quantities. Furthermore, decorative conch-shaped niches that adorned the winepresses indicate the great wealth of the factory owners. The production capacity of these winepresses suggested that approximately two million liters of wine were produced for here the market every year and we should remember that the whole process was conducted by hand.”
The white wine, which was colloquially known as Gaza or Ashkelon wine (after the ports it was dispatched to for export), was not the only discovery at the site. As first reported in LiveScience, archaeologists at the site in Yavne, found the small gold and (probable) amethyst ring a mere 150 meters from the warehouse that housed the wine jars. Rings don’t have a great deal to do with wine production, but some ancient gems were believed to have medico-magical properties. In Greek the word amethustos (from which we get amethyst) means “not drunken” or “without drunkenness” and may have referred to a substance—either the stone or a herb—that could act as a remedy for hangovers.
The archeologists who found the ring offer a variety of suggestions. Noting that amethysts are mentioned in the Bible and had a certain religious significance as well, Elie Haddad, director of the excavation, suggested that perhaps the wealthy owner of the ring was trying to avoid either a hangover or drunkenness itself. The problems with water purity and hygiene meant that many people drank alcohol as a matter of course, even when they weren’t trying to get tipsy. Dr. Matthew Anderson the author of the just-released Pairings: The Bible and Booze told me that in antiquity most people drank wine or beer. While beer was popular in Egypt (and clocked in at mere 2-3% alcohol) it didn’t have much of a shelf life and couldn’t easily be exported. It was also a bit low brow. Anderson said that beer was a “breakfast drink” for the less affluent. He mentioned the late second century CE Roman oenophile Athenaeus who wrote that “beer was invented to help those who could not afford wine.”
Wine on the other hand, Anderson said, was stronger than it is today and, thus, it “was considered uncouth not to cut it with water. Since ancient wines were not filtered, and the grape must (skin, seeds, and stems) was often added back in for more sugar, we would find most ancient wine to be ‘big,’ a bit like appassimento wines, juicy and strong, although rougher.” We get a taste of the range of strength and varieties of ancient wines in Israel from the story of the Wedding at Cana in the Gospel of John. Here the water that Jesus turns into wine turns out to be of a better quality than that supplied by the hosts producing one of the Bible’s socially awkward moments. Elsewhere, Isaiah 55 seems to suggest that in paradise we will drink wine and milk. This is good news for the lactose intolerant.
Beautiful amethyst rings that look as if they were made by the luxury archeologist-turned-goldsmith Loren Nicole were not the only ancient cure for hangovers, even if they are the prettiest. Nor was the Yavne ring the only wearable analgesic. A 1,900 year old papyrus discovered in 1898 at a garbage dump outside of Oxyrhynchus in Egypt and published in 2015 recommends wearing a laurel wreath around one’s neck as a necklace.
Wine’s popularity created something of a secondary market in hangover cures. The Roman poet Horace prescribed a meal of roasted onions and snails as his hair of the dog. Meanwhile the ancient Mesopotamians recommended consuming a concoction of licorice, beans, oleander, oil, and wine in the morning before sunrise as an antidote for the alcohol-induced headache. This one, however, has to be consumed before kissing anyone.
While you may doubt the efficacy of, well, any of these remedies at least the Yavne ring serves double duty as a piece of jewelry. This is something to think about as we move into the holiday season when gift-giving and adult beverages go hand-in-hand. Though the IRS is unlikely to consider such items tax deductible, one could make a compelling case to one’s partner that amethyst jewelry isn’t frivolous, it’s healthcare.
