Viking Rituals

Following on from a previous post on Mind Bending Meads I stumbled upon an interesting discussion from the Book of Shadows (the internet version) on the use of Mead in Viking rituals.

Mead is an important part of the Asatru religion and has a place in both of the major Norse rituals: The sumble is a drinking ritual where stories, oaths, and poetry are shared and mead.s function here is obvious. In this day and age mead is even more important to the blot or sacrifice ritual. The blot is actually quite simple. A God or Goddess is called upon and a sacrifice is poured in their honor. In ancient times this was most often an animal sacrifice and blood was poured out onto the ground or altar. Today an alcoholic beverage of some kind is the usual sacrifice.

Perhaps the act of writing a blog about mead is the 21st version of the sumble, telling stories with some assistance from the copious amounts of Mead I've been drinking.

The Book continues

One interesting item to start with is that mead was apparently sometimes strained through rye, which contains the hallucinogenic chemical ergot. This may offer some insights into Seidhr, a Nordic shamanic practice, and the frenzy of the berserkers.

Again an interesting combination of sweet Mead, the drink of the gods and a hallucinogenic shot.

And although I am not to be tempted from my workshop of Medb, who after all occupies the sacred space in my living room, she is perhaps not the only goddess (or god) appropriate to the Drinker of Mead.

Frey, a God of farming and harvest, was said to have two close companions, Bygvir and Beyla. Bygvir was the spirit of the barley and Beyla of the honey . both important Gods to brewers and appropriate companions for the God of fertility.

Finally, we have a few myths involving mead directly. Mead was known as Kvasir.s blood and it.s primary association was with wisdom. Kvasir was a being who was the wisest in all the universe, but he was killed and a mead created out of his blood that when drank brought the drinker wisdom. Aegir, a God of the Sea, was held to be the patron of brewing and the finest of mead and ale for the Gods to drink in Valhalla. Odin is said to never eat, but to exist purely on mead, just as the Greek Gods had their nectar.

Friary Vinters Mead

Hmmm I seem to be developing a nose for mead, or at least the ability to recognise what I’m about to get.

Friary Vitners smells once again like an ordinary Mead with that slightly sweet wine smell. The taste is initially very similar to many others, but with a much smoother sweetness and perhaps a bit more of a bite afterwards.

Then after a few more sips that bite blends into the smoothness, and the taste of sunlight slips in so something interesting going on here, and worth further investigation.

{later} This one truly shines with ice, as the smoothness carries through and the bitters blend away. So I started to ponder why.

The website states they don’t keep their own bees, but monks of the friary might have once done so. Clearly they’re buying honey from a nearby farm or somewhere more commercial.

The question arises to what extent is the taste of mead dependant on the recipe or on the bees and honey that supply the raw materials. To an extent one should acknowledge the purity of Mead makers who keep their own hives? Equally if the pollen is key then the flavour of the mead must vary with the crops and wildflowers grown locally. Perhaps an argument for better labelling for a genuine local Mead.

In this case the random factors have combined to produce a very pleasant mead indeed.

Catch the Bear Mead

This may be a slightly odd aside on the journey for Mead but yesterday somewhere between dressing like a Pirate and the usual peculiarities of Slimelight I finished a friend’s bottle of Catch the Bear Mead. Undoubtably a pun on honey bears.

At least I think it was Mead, at 36% abv it was definitely on the side of the honey brandies, poured from a glass bottle in the shape of a teddy bear. This slightly disturbed me, but then I’m already pretty disturbed, thus the picture.

A find at last years Witchfest, sold to my mate by a German dressed as a Scot, named Aengus MacLeod. Of course it was. We think this makes it a German mead, but who can tell

With the scent akin to Calvados, this one promises to be er… interesting, and the taste was that of a very sweet Potcheen. A shot of alcohol with enough honey and sugar to take the burning aftertaste away. Quite pleasant really, but probably never to be repeated.

Mind Bending Meads

In a previous post I casually tossed in a reference to a Mayan mead as an example of a Metheglin, in this instance made with Balche tree bark.

This might have been somewhat of an understatement, as Balche bridges the divide between alcohol and religious ceremony.

It is a well documented fact that the Maya, at least at the time of the Spanish conquest, were not only doing a variety of drugs but were consuming alcoholic beverages as well. Drunkenness was connected with the wide-spread practice of divination, a ritual act designed to allow direct communication with certain supernatural forces such that an individual could foretell the future or understand due causes far events not otherwise understood. A drunken state was supposed to give one the insight to interpret the reasons for illness, misfortune, adverse weather, and so forth. Does that not sound familiar? I have a couple of friends that get positively brilliant after a few rum and cokes.

The Maya, like most of the other Mesoamerican cultures, produced fermented alcoholic beverages from corn or agave cactus, the precursor to modem tequila. Another drink, specially flavored for ritual purposes, was a rather nasty brew called balche made from fermented honey and the bark of the balche tree. I have tried this delightful cocktail and rate it right up there with really bad cough medicine. From Dig It

I find religion intriguing, and choose to embrace a pantheon of gods, rather than a solitary bearded bloke sitting on a throne. Equally my suspicion is that a fair few religions have been inspired by Druid sitting in dark caves eating lots of magic mushrooms (or equivalent).

And although it’s been some years, I suspect dried mushrooms still taste like something the cat threw up. So the addition of a sweet mead may well be the best chaser to that spiritual trip. And Medb (according to some) appears as the goddess of intoxication, hemp, fly agaric, liberty caps and a few other mind bending substances.

Shee-eire continues on the subject of Fly-Agaric:

This is probably the most well known fungi because of it's association with the fairy folk and was a very important fungi to the Druids of the Celtic tribes. It was referred to as the 'Flesh of the gods', or 'Food of the Gods' because they believed that they were in direct communication with the Earth and the Universe when they consumed this Fungi.

Although all the Celtic people consumed Liberty-caps, the Fly-Agaric was usually only taken by the Druids and other magic users. It was considered too powerful for those not trained in the higher levels of the mind. This Fungus contains some very powerful psychotropic compounds.

The most common way that this mushroom was consumed was in the form of a beverage. Some of these drinks were alcoholic in nature. It was also eaten, smoked or absorbed through the skin in ointments, in the steam of the sweat-lodges or even in the waters of a bath.

And a more precise set of advice

Eating of the Fly-Agaric Mushroom : The most common way that this mushroom was eaten was when it had been dried. The Druid or Druids fasted for at least 3 days, drinking only water although sometimes small amounts of purifying herbs may also be taken and meditating before consumption of the fungi.

This was done for a number of reasons, not only to purify the mind but also it purified the body because the body acts in a strange way to this fungi. When consumed the body removes the Mind-Expanding substances before the poison. So the Psychedelic is in the body before it starts to react to the poison. This reaction is violent stomach emptying as the body rejects what's left of the mushroom before it absorbs any more of the poison.

The Druids were well prepared for this sickness as it was part of taking the fungi. After the poison is rejected the Psychedelic starts to act, this is when the second reason for body purity was needed as the first urine expelled after consumption is nearly all Psychedelic and this was either consumed at the time to give full effect of the fungi or stored for a later ritual. It may also have been used in some of their Beverages or Potions. This may sound a bit sick to some but with the 3 day fast and only water going in, only water was coming out.

So three days of fasting, followed by an excess of Mead and Mushooms, followed by vomiting, followed by the tribe drinking the urine of the Druid / Siberian Shamen (different reference)

One hopes that Medb appreciates the journeys people make to visit her realm.

Fallen Angel Dark Mead

I’m quite excited about this one, being somewhat of a Sandman fan, whose tipple of choice is a Dark Mead. The bottle’s very cool, with a threaded cork and a proper flask like shape. The name of the brewery’s evocative too, so perhaps I’m getting too excited.

The mead itself is a reddish brown colour, and at some point I’ll need to investigate what makes a dark mead, dark. The scent is that of a honey wine which doesn’t bode well, and the initial taste is very similar to one of the more ordinary meads.

It’s not unpleasant, and will probably be better chilled, but I was hoping for something spectacular. Ah well, it at least reinforces my idea to share the bottle.

With ice, and over time the scent becomes more subtle, and perhaps there is something different to the taste although I can’t quite make it out. A certain bite to it which may not be altogether pleasant.

Overall it’s far from the ‘drunken diabetics piss’ of American Gods, in fact its perfectly drinkable and as pleasant as most Mead. It’s just not what what I wanted

Expectations and ideals are sometimes better left in the bottle.

Pliny on Mead

Pliny has much to say on Mead in his natural histories, and specifically the medicinal benefits of Mead, of Honey and vinegar, of Mead with oil, with milk or even with breadcrumbs.

Also of importance is the water you make the Mead with, Pliny suggests rainwater aged for at least 5 years.

Equally it’s not clear where the line between a honey / water mixture and fermented Mead are.

Hydromeli, or Melicration
There is a wine also made solely of honey and water. For this purpose it is recommended that rain-water should be kept for a period of five years. Those who shew greater skill, content themselves with taking the water just after it has fallen, and boiling it down to one third, to which they then add one third in quantity of old honey, and keep the mixture exposed to the rays of a hot sun for forty days after the rising of the Dog-star; others, however, rack it off in the course of ten days, and tightly cork the vessels in which it is kept. This beverage is known as "hydromeli," and with age acquires the flavour of wine. It is nowhere more highly esteemed than in Phrygia.

How Hydromeli is made
Hydromeli, also, was a mixture formerly made with pure rain-water and honey, and was prescribed for patients who, were anxious for wine, as being a more harmless drink. For these many years past, however, it has been condemned, as having in reality all the inconveniences of wine, without the advantages.

The various influences of different aliments upon the disposistion
While speaking of the uses of honey, we ought also to treat of the properties of hydromel. There are two kinds of hydromel, one of which is prepared at the moment, and taken while fresh, the other being kept to ripen. The first, which is made of skimmed honey, is an extremely wholesome beverage for invalids who take nothing but a light diet, such as strained alica for instance: it reinvigorates the body, is soothing to the mouth and stomach, and by its refreshing properties allays feverish heats. I find it stated, too, by some authors, that to relax the bowels it should be taken cold, and that it is particularly well-suited for persons of a chilly temperament, or of a weak and pusillanimous4 constitution, such as the Greeks, for instance, call "micropsychi."

Hydromel: eighteen remedies
Hydromel is recommended, too, as very good for a cough: taken warm, it promotes vomiting. With the addition of oil it counteracts the poison of white lead; of henbane, also, and of the halicacabum, as already stated, if taken in milk, asses' milk in particular. It is used as an injection for diseases of the ears, and in cases of fistula of the generative organs. With crumb of bread it is applied as a poultice to the uterus, as also to tumours suddenly formed, sprains, and all affections which require soothing applications. The more recent writers have condemned the use of fermented hydro- mel, as being not so harmless as water, and less strengthening than wine. After it has been kept a considerable time, it becomes transformed into a wine, which, it is universally agreed, is extremely prejudicial to the stomach, and injurious to the nerves.

Oxymeli
Vinegar even has been mixed with honey; nothing, in fact, has been left untried by man. To this mixture the name of oxymeli has been given; it is compounded of ten pounds of honey, five semi-sextarii of old vinegar, one pound of sea-salt, and five sextarii of rain-water. This is boiled gently till the mixture has bubbled in the pot some ten times, after which it is drawn off, and kept till it is old; all these wines, however, are condemned by Themison, an author of high authority. And really, by Hercules! the use of them does appear to be somewhat forced, unless, indeed, we are ready to maintain that these aromatic wines are so many compounds taught us by Nature, as well as those that are manufactured of perfumes, or that shrubs and plants have been generated only for the purpose of being swallowed in drink. However, all these particulars, when known, are curious and interesting, and show how successfully the human intellect has pried into every secret.

None of these wines, however, will keep beyond a year, with the sole exception of those which we have spoken of as requiring age; many of these, indeed, there can be no doubt, do not improve after being kept so little as thirty days.

Godshill Mead

First of the haul from Middle Farm, I thought I’d try something undemanding first. Hey I waited 24 hours, and am saving the best till last.

A small corked bottle, and a good name for a Mead, the bottle seemed to almost ooze honey. The aroma seems remenscent of fairly rough cider, although that may be my mind playing tricks, I’ve been to Godshill. I also like rough cider.

Initial tasting is a bit sweet and sickly, in the manner of Harvest Gold or Norfolk Mead. The after taste is more pleasant but again feels more like a flavoured wine (or even a cider) than a Mead.

The bottle describes it as a country wine from the Isle of Wight. The website reads thus:

Thought to be the most ancient alcoholic drink, dating back some 12,000 years, before wine, beer and even cider. Our mead is made from fermented honey, and is medium in sweetness.

They also do a Christmas Mead so an excuse to visit Wigit

A better experience slightly chilled, or with ice, as the sweeter sense blends into the ice, but still nothing special. I appear to be becoming a Mead snob, which I guess was the inevitable intention all along.