It would have tasted very different than today's brews.
(PhysOrg.com) -- A scientist studying an ancient Celtic site believes he has worked out the recipe they used for making beer around the year 500 BC.
Dr Hans-Peter Stika, an archaeobotanist from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart, Germany has been studying the remains of an early Iron Age Celtic settlement at Eberdingen-Hochdorf dating from around 500 BC, in particular the six oblong ditches dug for the process of making barley malt for beer. The excavated ditches contained thousands of grains of charred barley, which Dr Stika believes are the remains of the production of high quality barley malt needed for making beer.
Dr Stika reproduced several methods for making beer that the Celtic peoples in the Iron Age might have used, and concluded that the ditches were used to soak barley grains until they sprouted. Fires were then lit at either end of the ditch to slowly dry the sprouted grains and give the malt produced a dark color and smoky flavor.