BOB WILLIAMS / For The Inquirer
Patrick McGovern pours a glass of Chicha, a collaboration with Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head brewing.
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Penn archaeologist recreates ancient brews
Patrick McGovern had just emerged from the ancient burial chamber in one of the most extensively excavated archaeological sites in China when a local scientist presented him with what he calls "the real treasure."
It was a sealed bronze drinking vessel that resembled a teapot from 1200 B.C.
With liquid still inside.
"I just about dropped over - a liquid sample from 3,000 years ago," said McGovern, a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania.
He whisked a sample back to his lab in the basement of Penn's Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. An analysis confirmed what he had suspected: a yellowish wine.
It was another eureka moment for McGovern, 64, who has spent the last two decades traversing the globe, from ancient capitals to remote villages, in a quest to uncover the secrets of ancient wine- and beer-making.
He has become internationally recognized as an authority on ancient potables. When he and other museum researchers were on the budget chopping block earlier this year, nearly 4,000 supporters signed a petition, among them archaeologists, curators, and government officials from countries around the world. Egypt's director of antiquities was one of them.
"You find out who your friends are," said McGovern, whose job was spared.
This month, he released a book, Uncorking the Past, which describes his research, including his collaboration with Delaware beer brewer Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head to re-create ancient beverages with recipes he found.
Last week, at an event at the University Museum, he and Calagione detailed their latest quirky foray: making an ancient Peruvian beer that required them to spend hours chewing purple corn - using their saliva as part of the fermentation process.
Two months ago, McGovern traveled to Lebanon's Bekaa Valley at the behest of a Syrian Lebanese winemaker who wants to open a wine museum there. He'll be heading back this month for further consultation.
"My husband loves what he does," McGovern's wife, Doris, said during an interview in the couple's woodsy Media home, where a wine magazine and a beer book sat atop a reading table. "It's a consuming passion."
His first experience with potables came on a student bicycle tour through the German Alps when he was 16. He drank Coca-Cola until he discovered beer was cheaper.
When he returned home to Upstate New York, he wanted more beer. So he dressed in lederhosen and a green hat, went to a bar and, pretending to be foreign, asked for a beer in German. He got it.
His first acquaintance with wine came in 1971 as he and his wife backpacked around Europe with little money. They visited towns along the Mosel River in Germany, seeking work at vineyards. The couple landed a three-week gig in Trittenheim.
"That's where I really got the whole notion of vintage worked out," McGovern said. "By the end, you knew 1959 was a superb year. Sixty-nine was awful. The year we worked there - 1971 - was like the vintage of the century."
Born in Texas, McGovern - the son of an engineer and teacher - grew up in New York, earned a degree in chemistry from Cornell University, and considered becoming a neuroscientist. But his interest turned to archaeology, and in 1977, he began working at Penn, where he got his doctorate in 1980.
"I was really wondering what man's place in the universe was, how we got here," he said.
It was, at times, a hard life. On research trips, he sometimes slept in buildings with no mattresses or heat.
He hasn't seen his face in 35 years. He gave up shaving after trips to spots lacking much hot water; his bushy beard and mustache have gone from black to white.
