The Speyer wine bottle (or ''Römerwein'') is a sealed vessel, presumed to contain liquid

wine Wine is an alcoholic drink typically made from fermented grapes. Yeast consumes the sugar in the grapes and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Different varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are m ...

, and so named because it was unearthed from a

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

tomb found near

Speyer Speyer (, older spelling ''Speier'', French: ''Spire,'' historical English: ''Spires''; pfl, Schbaija) is a city in Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany with approximately 50,000 inhabitants. Located on the left bank of the river Rhine, Speyer li ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. It is considered the world's oldest known bottle of wine.

History

The Speyer wine bottle most likely holds wine, and was originally found in 1867, in what is now the

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

region of Germany near Speyer, one of the oldest settlements in the area. The artifact has since become known as "the world's oldest existing bottle of wine". The bottle has been dated between 325 and 350 AD and is the oldest known unopened bottle of wine in the world. Since its discovery, it has been exhibited at the Wine Museum section of the

Historical Museum of the Palatinate The Historical Museum of the Palatinate (german: Historisches Museum der Pfalz) is a museum in the city of Speyer in the Palatinate region of the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It is situated across the square from the Speyer Cathedral. ...

in Speyer, always displayed in the same location within the museum. The "Römerwein" is housed in the museum's Tower Room. It is a glass vessel with

amphora An amphora (; grc, ἀμφορεύς, ''amphoreús''; English plural: amphorae or amphoras) is a type of container with a pointed bottom and characteristic shape and size which fit tightly (and therefore safely) against each other in storag ...

-like "shoulders," yellow-green in color, with dolphin-shaped handles.

Discovery

The bottle was discovered during an excavation in a 4th-century AD Roman nobleman's tomb. The tomb contained two

sarcophagi A sarcophagus (plural sarcophagi or sarcophaguses) is a box-like funeral receptacle for a cadaver, corpse, most commonly carved in stone, and usually displayed above ground, though it may also be buried. The word ''sarcophagus'' comes from ...

, one holding the body of a man and one a woman. One source says the man was a

Roman legionary The Roman legionary (in Latin ''legionarius'', plural ''legionarii'') was a professional heavy infantryman of the Roman army after the Marian reforms. These soldiers would conquer and defend the territories of ancient Rome during the late Republi ...

and the wine was a provision for his celestial journey. Of the six glass bottles in the woman's sarcophagus and the ten vessels in the man's sarcophagus, only one still contained a liquid. There is a clear liquid in the bottom third, and a mixture similar to

rosin Rosin (), also called colophony or Greek pitch ( la, links=no, pix graeca), is a solid form of resin obtained from pines and some other plants, mostly conifers, produced by heating fresh liquid resin to vaporize the volatile liquid terpene comp ...

above.

Wine preservation

While it has reportedly lost its

ethanol Ethanol (abbr. EtOH; also called ethyl alcohol, grain alcohol, drinking alcohol, or simply alcohol) is an organic compound. It is an Alcohol (chemistry), alcohol with the chemical formula . Its formula can be also written as or (an ethyl ...

content, analysis is consistent with at least part of the liquid having been

. The wine was infused with a mixture of herbs. The preservation of the wine is attributed to the large amount of thick

olive oil Olive oil is a liquid fat obtained from olives (the fruit of ''Olea europaea''; family Oleaceae), a traditional tree crop of the Mediterranean Basin, produced by pressing whole olives and extracting the oil. It is commonly used in cooking: f ...

, added to the bottle to seal the wine off from air, along with a hot wax seal.

Petronius Gaius Petronius Arbiter"Gaius Petronius Arbiter"
Satyricon The ''Satyricon'', ''Satyricon'' ''liber'' (''The Book of Satyrlike Adventures''), or ''Satyrica'', is a Latin work of fiction believed to have been written by Gaius Petronius, though the manuscript tradition identifies the author as Titus Petro ...

'', writes of plaster sealed bottles, and this one is analogous. The use of glass in the bottle is unusual, however, as typically

Roman glass Roman glass objects have been recovered across the Roman empire, Roman Empire in domestic, industrial and funerary contexts. Glass was used primarily for the production of vessels, although mosaic tiles and window glass were also produced. Roman g ...

was too fragile to be dependable over time. While scientists have considered accessing the liquid to further analyze the content, as of 2022 the bottle has remained unopened, because of concerns about how the liquid would react when exposed to air. The museum's curator, Ludger Tekampe, has stated he has seen no variation in the bottle in the last 25 years.

Notes

References

External links