(beer), and wine (made from fruit) are the most common alcoholic drinks found in ancient civilizations, so it is also assumed that these ingredients were mixed together to create honey-flavored beverages. In addition, it is imagined that herbs and spices were thrown in to infuse more flavor, and possibly steeped medicinal herbs were used on occasion. Social drinking has been part of every culture in some form and with time, people began to travel (for various reasons) and needed shelter, so humble inns along their path provided temporary housing, food, and drink—the same basic amenities modern hotels provide today. Public houses (pubs) were built in towns and served as “information hubs” where you learned of current events, gossiped, complained about the weather, flirted, told stories, and, of course, drank. Things pretty much remained the same for hundreds of years.
There have been many theories of where the word “cocktail” came from. Some include an Aztec princess, an Ancient Roman doctor who called a favorite drink cockwine, a New Orleans French egg cup, Cock Ale Punch that was actually made with a whole rooster and ale (ick!), a gingerroot suppository for a non-spirited horse, and a tavern keeper who put rooster tail feathers in soldiers’ drinks (cock-tail).
The first known reference to the Asian spirit “arrack” was by traveling merchants in the 1200s. In the 1300s the word “aqua vitae” (“water of life”) was coined and Armagnac and Scotch whisky were being produced in the 1400s. But the first record of a spirit (an early rum) being mixed with three other ingredients in bulk was for ill sailors in the 1500s. Between the 1600s and 1800s, communal drinks were served in big bowls—with cups for all. These cups and bowls gave birth to the individual-sized cocktail we know today.
The Top Ten Things to Know about Cocktails
1.No one knows who invented the cocktail, but it is agreed that communal batches served in punch bowls then drank from cups in the 1600s gave birth to the individual cocktail we know today.
2.There have been many theories about the origin of the word “cocktail.” As of today, it has been narrowed down to two. One comes from a 1700s word in the horse trade profession, and the other from a fictional character based on a real person, but neither has been confirmed.
3.To date, the first printed form of the word “cocktail” appeared in 1798. The word pertaining to the drink was first printed in 1803 and the first printed definition was in 1806.
4.The first known British drink receipt (recipe) book was published in 1827. The first known American cocktail recipe book was published in 1862.
5.As far as we know, the Mint Julep is America’s first cocktail.
6.Before the 1920s, in America, fancy cocktails were drunk by prominent white males in fancy saloons and bars. The average joe drank beer, wine, whiskey, and cider at pubs, while a fancy bar might have a side room for fancy women called the “Ladies’ Bar.” The only women allowed in the main bar were madams and prostitutes.
7.The first golden age of the cocktail was between 1860 and 1919, and the seed for the second golden age of the cocktail was planted around the millennium.
8.The Martini is the most iconic cocktail and symbol of the cocktail culture.
9.The repeal of the American Prohibition, women’s freedom to socialize in most bars, and Hollywood technology (talkies) glamorized cocktails between the 1930s and 1960s.
10.The world’s largest cocktail festival, Tales of the Cocktail, has been held in New Orleans each July since 2002.
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A Cocktail Timeline
1500s
If you owned a pub, alehouse, tavern, or inn, you were probably growing your own food for meals and drink to serve guests. In addition to having land for a garden, you needed to tend to animals, provide stables for travelers (we call them parking lots today), have an area to produce alcoholic drink, and be literate enough to keep books, pay bills, manage help, and collect payments. Tavern floors were often made of sand, and it was common to have a portcullis (metal vertical closing gate) around the bar area. To multitask dinner, a kitchen dog was often placed in a turnspit wheel—the dog would walk inside the wheel, which slowly turned meat roasting over a fire.
Names of alehouses, pubs, taverns, and inns included Beverley Arms, Black Lion, Boar’s Head, Bull Long Medford, Crown Sarre, King’s Head, the Crane Inn, the Devil’s Tavern, the George, the Lion, the Prospect of Whitby, the White Horse, and Ye Olde Mitre.
Drinking words heard were “aled up,” “befuddled,” “bizzled,” “drinking deep,” “has on a barley cap,” “has more than one can hold,” “lion drunk,” “malt above the meal,” “rowdy,” “swallowed a tavern token,” “shattered,” “shaved,” “swilled up,” “wassailed,” and “whittled.”
New brands and spirits created in the 1500s included aguardiente de caña (rum), brandy, cachaça, Disarrono, jenever, kummel, mezcal, pisco, and Scotch whiskey.
1500 − Sugarcane is harvested in Hispaniola to be used to make rum.
−Scotland’s King James IV grants the production of aqua vitae.
1514 − King Louis XII of France licenses vinegar producers to distill eau-de-vie.
1518 − Spanish ruler Charles V imports 2,000 slaves to Hispaniola to work the sugarcane fields.
1525 − Amaretto Disaronno is produced in Italy.
−A groundbreaking distilling book is published and inspires Holland to produce brandewijn (burnt wine).
1531 − Spanish settlers distill the local fermented drink in Mexico to make mexcalli (mezcal).
1533 − Sugarcane eau-de-vie is created (later known as cachaça).
−Monks in the Italian mountains make liqueurs.
1534 − A book with over seventy vodka-based medicines is published. It is the first time the word “vodka” is documented.
1537 − King Francis I of France grants the production of eau-de-vie.
1538 − Peruvian farmers make what we know today as pisco.
1552 − In the book Constelijck Distilleer Boek, Philippus Hermanni refers to a juniper-infused eau-de-vie in his 1568.
1575 − Lucas Bols sets up a distillery in Amsterdam and begins making jenever.
1586 − Aguardiente de caña (basically, rum), hierba buena (Cuban herbal plant that belongs to the mint family), limes, and sugar were batched for a ship of sick sailors and its British sea captain, Sir Francis Drake (nicknamed El Draque—Spanish for “the dragon”). All that was needed was an addition of fizzy water and they’d have had themselves a barrel of Mojitos.
1600s
We have a good idea of what taverns and pubs looked like because Dutch painter Jan Steen painted detailed daily life paintings. His paintings related to drinking include Prince’s Day in a Tavern (1660; he painted himself in the painting), Tavern Garden (1660), In the Tavern (1660), The Drinker (1660), A Merry Party (1660), Peasants Before an Inn (1653), Leaving the Tavern (unknown date), Merry Company on a Terrace (1670), and Tavern Scene (1670). Things seen in Steen’s paintings are jugs, bottles, vessels (some made of glass), sheet music, musical instruments, flirting, fire, food, laughter, games,
