ALE, an intoxicating beverage com posed of barley or other grain steeped in water and afterwards fermented, has been used from very early times. Pliny the Elder states that in his time it was used among the nations who inhabited the western part of Europe. He says (Hist. Nat., xiv. 29, ed. Hardouin) that the Western nations have intoxicating liquors made of grain steeped, and that the mode of making them is different in the pro vinces of Gaul and Spain, and their names different, though the principle is the same : he adds that in Spain they had the art of making these liquors keep. He also mentions the use of beer by the Egyptians, to which he gives the name of " Zythum." The Spanish name for it cel i a" or " ceria : ' in Gaul it was called " eervisia," a word which was in troduced into the Latin language, and is also preserved in the French " cervoise." (Pliny, xx. 25; Richelet, Dictionnaire.) Pliny evidently alludes to the process of fermentation, when he says that the foam (spuma) was used by the women for im proving the skin of their faces.
Herodotus, who wrote 500 years before Pliny, tells us that the Egyptians used a liquor made of barley (fi. 77). Dion Cassius says that the Pannonian made a drink of barley and millet (lib. xlix. C. 36, and the note in Reimar's edition). Tacitus states that the ancient Germans "for their drink drew a liquor from bar ley or other grain, and fermented it so as to make it resemble wine." (Tacitus, De Mor. Germ. c. 23.) Ale was also the favourite liquor of the Anglo-Saxons and Danes ; it is constantly mentioned as used in their feasts ; and before the intro duction of Christianity among the North ern nations, it was an article of belief that drinking copious draughts of ale formed one of the chief felicities of their heroes in the Hall of Odin. The word ale is metonymically used as a term for a feast in several of the ancient Northern languages. Thus the Dano-Saxon word lol, the Icelandic 01, the Suedo-Gothic Oel, the Anglo-Saxon Geol, and our English word Yule are said to be syno nymous with feast, and hence the terms Leet-ale, Lamb-ale, Whitsun-ale, Clerk ale, Bride-ale, Church-ale, Midsummer ale, &c. (Ellis's ed. of Brand's Anti
quities, i. p. 159, also p. 258.) Ale is mentioned as one of the liquors provided for a royal banquet in the reign of Edward the Confessor. If the accounts given by Isidorus and Orosius of the method of making ale amongst the ancient Britons and other Celtic nations be correct, it is evident that it did not materially differ from our modern brewing. They state " that the grain is steeped in water and made to germinate ; it is then dried and ground ; after which it is infused in a certain quantity of water, which is after wards fermented." (Henry's History of England, vol. ii. p. 364.) In early periods of the history of Eng land, ale and bread appear to have been considered as equally victuals or absolute necessaries of life. This appears from the various assizes or ordinances of bread and ale (assists panic et cervisite) which were passed from time to time for the purpose of regulating the price and qua lity of these articles. In the 51st year of the reign of Henry III. (1266) a statute was passed, the preamble of which al ludes to earlier statutes on the same sub ject, by which a graduated scale was established for the price of ale through out England. It declared that " when a quarter of wheat was sold for three shil lings, or three shillings and four-pence, and a quarter of barley for twenty pence or twenty-four pence, and a quarter of oats for fifteen pence, brewers in cities could afford to sell two gallons of ale for a penny, and out of cities three gallons for a penny ; and when in a town (in burgo) three gallons are sold for a penny, out of a town they may and ought to sell four." In process of time this uniform scale of price became extremely incon venient; and by the statute 23 Henry VIII. c. 4, it was enacted that ale brewers should charge for their ale such prices as might appear convenient and sufficient in the discretion of the justices of the peace or mayors within whose jurisdiction such ale-brewers should dwell. The price of ale was regulated by rules like those above stated, and the quality was ascertained by officers appointed for the purpose. [ALE-Como:Rd