Wine was both a staple and a valuable commodity to be bought and sold. Vineyards were largely owned by nobles who could also enjoy wine on an everyday basis, while ordinary people typically drank it only during festivals, or might receive it as a work bonus.
Scenes of the grape harvest appear in several tombs, the earliest from the Old Kingdom in the third millennium BC. Some tomb depictions show the whole winemaking process from harvesting, treading and pressing to fermentation. In these illustrations, wine is most often presented in a small round cup.
Over time, Egyptian wine began to be exported, particularly after Alexandria, founded in the fourth century BC by Alexander the Great, became a global trading hub. Recently discovered wine amphorae – bottles with two small looped handles – demonstrate that wine from around Lake Mareotis (or Mariout), lying immediately south of Alexandria, reached destinations on the Strait of Sicily and as far as the coast of what’s now southern France near Marseille. Several classical writers, including the Roman poets Horace and Virgil, mentioned Mareotic wine; the Greek writer Athenaeus described it as “pleasant [and] fragrant”. Cleopatra is said to have carried Mareotic wine on her fleet.
God of wine
Wine wasn’t just a pleasant drink in ancient Egypt – it was linked to significant episodes in foundational mythology.
In a pivotal tale, green-faced Osiris (below) – one of the most significant gods in the ancient Egyptian pantheon – was murdered by his jealous brother, Set, who locked him in a coffin and threw it into the Nile. Osiris’s blood infused the river with rich minerals, and caused the annual flooding that underpins the Egyptian soil’s fertility – an event that, to the ancient population, was nothing short of divine.
According to Greek and Roman historians, excess soil washed into the Nile turned the river a reddish colour. In the ancient myth, though, it was Osiris’s blood that was not only turning the waters red but also irrigating and nourishing crops.
In the story, Osiris’s remains were found by his wife, Isis, who carefully put his body parts back together. He returned to life, and impregnated her with the god Horus. Naturally, Osiris’s death and resurrection led him to become associated with rejuvenation, paralleling the cycle of the land from one harvest to the next – including the renewing grapevine.
In the Temple of Edfu, built 237–57 BC on the site of an earlier monument between Luxor and Aswan, one inscription reveals how the local “vineyard flourishes” when the “inundation” of the Nile takes place and the land “bears fruit with more grapes than [the sand of] the riverbanks”. Because wine production depended on the annual flooding, Osiris became closely connected with the drink – especially red wine, which closely resembles soil and blood.
In the Pyramid Texts – the oldest funerary texts, dating to the third millennium BC – Osiris, earlier venerated as the god of agriculture and resurrection, is described as the “lord of wine in flood”. He was regarded by Egyptians as the originator and teacher of viticulture and winemaking.
Drunken deities
Considered the blood of the gods, red wine was a common offering in temples. Osiris, in particular, was honoured through annual offerings of grain and wine. Because red wine wasn’t always affordable, barley wine (essentially a kind of beer) was often substituted.
In everyday life, Egyptians referred to wine as the ‘eye of Horus’, the divine child of Osiris and Isis. One ritual involved pouring wine into a depression on the temple altar, also called the Eye of Horus – a reference to the injury he sustained during the battle with his uncle Set, god of violence. In that episode, Horus’s eye lost its blood, so filling the altar depression with wine represented rejuvenation.
In another myth, when the rule of sun god Ra was coming to an end, he sent his daughter Hathor – in the form of Sekhmet, a lion-headed warrior – to destroy the mortals who’d conspired against him. Sekhmet got carried away, and looked set to destroy all of humanity, so Ra and the other gods devised a strategy to stop her. They poured red-dyed beer, or wine, to create lakes throughout the land. Believing that these pools were filled with blood, Sekhmet quaffed them, became intoxicated and fell asleep. In another version of the tale, her wrath was quelled using the power of music, dance and wine.
Recalling this story, at a new year Festival of Drunkenness people celebrated and re-enacted the god’s plan that saved humanity, while also being sure to appease the wrathful goddess.
Other deities were honoured with wine, not least Shesmu, god of the wine press. Texts from the third millennium BC record a feast during which grapes were pressed as the people sang that god’s name. Because red wine looked similar to blood, Shesmu came to be associated with punishment for serious crimes. In coffin texts and one discovered papyrus, Shesmu fills his wine press not with grapes but with the heads of criminals, then squeezes them into agonising oblivion for their unforgivable sins.
Pharaoh’s finest
In ancient Egyptian texts, the pharaoh is variously described as a “winegrower” and “brewer”, as well as the “cupbearer” to the gods. And around 400 scenes depicting wine offerings are found in temples from the Greco-Roman period, especially near wine-producing locations. These show pharaohs using wine to get closer to the gods and to bless the lands.
For example, in the Temple of Dendera, on the Nile north of Luxor, an illustration alongside the inscription “good wine, I pour it on the ground” shows a cup being tilted downwards, its liquid flowing out in zigzags. And the Temple of Abydos to the west features a clear depiction of Pharaoh Seti I making an offering to Osiris.
The grapevine – which grows fresh leaves and appears renewed each year – was an important item in funerary rituals, too, increasing a deceased person’s chances of resurrection. When a pharaoh was laid to rest, their tomb was filled with enough wine to take into the afterlife, either in real jars or in the form of wall paintings. Wine was placed in tombs as early as the fourth millennium BC – for example, in the resting place of Scorpion I (c3250 BC).
Among the 5,398 items found in the tomb of Tutankhamun were jars of wine inscribed with the winemaker’s name and the year of production, indicating a sophisticated wine culture. These included eight jars of the most exclusive variety, shedeh.
Analysis of the residues in these vessels revealed that they’d contained both red and white wines. Some wines, oils and foods were stored in the annex but, notably, two wine jars were placed alongside Tutankhamun’s body in the burial chamber. The red wine was placed to the west of his remains, while the white wine was set to the east, suggesting that this placement was an essential part of the burial ritual and held huge symbolic value, representing regeneration and rebirth.
Doctoring drinks
Wine was an ingredient in medicinal recipes from the fourth millennium BC. Evidence from papyri reveals that its uses varied widely: in treating infections, as an anaesthetic, applied to wounds as an antiseptic, mixed with herbs to create a sedative. As Greek influence in Egypt increased, the theories of Hippocrates (c460–c375 BC) spread – including that wine was a useful cooling agent for fevers, and that it could be used to nourish the body, purge sadness and help urine flow.
Wine jars retaining residues of herbs and balms have been discovered. Medicinal plants were added to create infused wines, or elixirs: fenugreek to treat fevers and indigestion, honey to make an antibiotic, mandrake as a narcotic and, under the instruction of a priest, opium as a sedative.
Coriander-infused wine was consumed by women to ease menstrual pain. Wine was mixed with water to make cleansing vaginal douches, with myrrh sometimes added as an antiseptic. It was even used in a kind of pregnancy test referenced in a papyrus dating from 1550 BC, which explains how a doctor should mix a urine sample with wine. A reaction between the fermented liquid and the urine’s chemical compounds would indicate that a baby was on the way.
Wine also became a key component of the embalming process, which was believed to guarantee a better afterlife. After most internal organs had been scooped out of a cadaver in preparation for mummification, it was cleansed thoroughly with a mixture of water and wine. The retained organs – stomach, intestines, liver and lungs – were also washed with wine ready for dehydration. This inhibited bacterial growth, slowing decomposition.
Wine-powered wonders
After the Ptolemies moved Egypt’s capital to Alexandria in the late fourth century BC, the state began organising grandiose festivals – demonstrations of power and wealth. These aimed to deter potential invaders and boosted the economy, with traders travelling to the city from far and wide during festival season.
We have a fascinating first-hand account by Callixenus of Rhodes, who likely lived in the second or third century BC and whose original writing – now lost – was quoted by the Greek writer Athenaeus a few centuries later. He described a magnificent and highly choreographed festival featuring performances by sileni, the drunken followers of Dionysus, Greek god of wine. An incredible float pulled by 300 men carried a wine press measuring 11 by 7 metres, dispensing local wine to the cheering crowds.
Such mechanical innovations were possible thanks to scholars at the city’s Great Library. Third-century BC inventor Ctesibius of Alexandria even devised singing statues. One of these, which depicted Arsinoë II (who co-ruled Egypt with her brother and husband Ptolemy II) as the goddess Aphrodite, played music as wine flowed out. He may also have created a hydraulic pump to transfer wine.
Working in the first or second century AD, Heron (or Hero) of Alexandria produced more such innovations; his Pneumatica contained no fewer than 16 wine-related inventions. He created the first vending machine, which dispensed measured amounts of liquid when a coin was inserted, and a self-filling wine bowl. He also invented a vessel with multiple spouts that alternately poured water and wine, or a mixture. So in Alexandria, water could indeed be turned into wine.
This article was first published in the May 2025 issue of BBC History Magazine
