Drinkers and drinking practices

Abstract

Abstract The chapter “Drinkers and Drinking Practices” addresses two questions: How did people drink beer in ancient Mesopotamia? And who drank beer? The chapter begins with a close look at the tomb of Puabi, an early queen interred in a lavish burial chamber in the Royal Cemetery of Ur. Puabi’s tomb included abundant drinking equipment and three cylinder seals depicting banquet scenes. Nearby, the so-called Great Death Pit preserved evidence for funerary rites that included large-scale human sacrifice and further cylinder seals bearing banquet scenes. Building on this famous evidence from Ur, the chapter then explores the question of how drinkers drank. It uses both artistic evidence and archaeological remains to consider, first, the drinking of beer through straws and, second, the drinking of beer from cups. The chapter then turns to the question of who drank beer, focusing in particular on issues of gender, status, and age.