The Washington Post: “Earliest evidence of wine found in giant, 8,000-year-old jars”

A Neolithic wine jar from Georgia. Photo source: Georgian National Museum
Agenda.ge, Nov 14, 2017, Tbilisi, Georgia

The Washington Post has published an article which refers to ancient Georgians as the first wine-makers.

"At the next holiday dinner, when the discussion turns to politics and you reach for a second glass of merlot, consider this: Your social lubricant has 8,000-year-old roots. People were fermenting grapes and storing wine in massive jugs as long ago as 6000 B.C., according to a study published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences”, the article says.

It stresses that the new research pushes chemical evidence of wine 600 to 1,000 years before the previous, oldest estimates.

The author suggests that ancient Georgians could have stored 300 liters of wine in the jars, which are about three feet tall. Small clay bumps are clustered around the rim. These decorations, the researchers hypothesise, represent grapes.