2026 / Beer History / ResearchBeer History / ResearchПБПA study of a 1756 archival plan tentatively associated with the Bakszty (Bakshty) estate in Ashmyany County. The labels for kettles, the malt house, spirits stores and an ox stable suggest that brewing and grain-spirit production may have operated together at this estate complex.
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2026 / Beer History / ResearchBeer History / ResearchПБПHow did Antoni Tyzenhauz’s economic reforms influence brewing in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania during the second half of the eighteenth century? Czech brewers, masonry breweries, malt production and hop cultivation are examined through historical studies and archival documents.
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2025 / Sources and documentsSources and documentsПБПHow was beer brewed in Belarusian lands at the beginning of the 18th century? The 1704 inventory of Sapockin reveals two brewhouses, brewing regulations, production fees, lease arrangements and the role of a watermill. Using this town in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania as an example, we explore the economic history of Belarusian brewing.
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2025 / Related drinksRelated drinksПБПThe history of harelka (gorzałka) and grain-based distillation in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, based on Gabriel Rzączyński's 1721 work. Discover how strong spirits were produced, which grains and spices were used, why Gdańsk's anise-flavoured spirit became an export product, and what role distilled beverages played in the culture and medicine of our ancestors.
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2025 / Beer History / ResearchBeer History / ResearchПБПWhat was beer like in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth during the 17th and 18th centuries? Drawing on Gabriel Rzączyński’s 1721 work, this article explores beer varieties and prices, the grain trade, brewing centers in Belarus, Lithuania, and Poland, the importance of water, and historical beliefs about beer’s properties.
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2025 / Related drinksRelated drinksПБПMead had a centuries-old history in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and was regarded as a northern counterpart to wine. Drawing on Gabriel Rzączyński’s 1721 work, this article explores historical accounts of honey and mead from Lithuania, Ruthenia, Samogitia, Volhynia, Courland and neighbouring regions, with particular attention to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the lands of present-day Belarus.
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2025 / Related drinksRelated drinksПБПSixteenth- and seventeenth-century sources describe extraordinary quantities of honey in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and neighbouring lands — including tales of honey-filled traps, bears, and a peasant rescued from a hollow tree by a frightened she-bear.
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2025 / Culture and everyday lifeCulture and everyday lifeПБПA source from 1700 preserves a detailed description of a pagan spring ritual involving beer, also known from the chronicle of Maciej Stryjkowski. A priest drank beer from a vessel without using his hands and then threw it behind his back. The text explicitly mentions Lithuanians, Ruthenians and other peoples of the region.
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2025 / Beer History / ResearchBeer History / ResearchПБПThis article examines three seventeenth-century medical sources that describe beer and honey-based drinks, their properties, and their effects on health. Particular attention is given to references to Lithuania and the eastern lands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as regions associated with brewing and traditional mead making.
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2025 / Related drinksRelated drinksПБПSources from the 16th–19th centuries describe drinks made from hogweed that were fermented and consumed instead of beer in Lithuania, Poland and neighbouring lands. Some of this evidence is directly connected with Grodno, Polesia and other territories of present-day Belarus. Based on these sources, I propose a hypothesis: early “borshch” may originally have been a fermented, probably low-alcohol liquid base similar to kvass or light beer, with the name only later passing to the soup we know today.
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2025 / Beer History / ResearchBeer History / ResearchПБПIn a German edition published in 1554, the physician Ioannes Placotomus discussed Polish and Lithuanian beers and referred to excellent “Lithuanian honey” gathered from linden blossoms. This article examines what the Latin source actually says, what “Lithuania” meant in the sixteenth century, and why the evidence is relevant to the history of beer and honey-based drinks in the lands of present-day Belarus.
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2025 / Sources and documentsSources and documentsПБПIn 1658, Jan Amos Comenius published Orbis Sensualium Pictus, a famous illustrated textbook that included a chapter on brewing. This article examines how the book circulated in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, what its brewery illustration actually showed, and why an alembic appeared alongside the brewing equipment.
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2025 / Culture and everyday lifeCulture and everyday lifeПБПHow was beer used in the pagan rites of Lithuania, Samogitia and neighbouring Baltic lands in the sixteenth century? Maciej Stryjkowski’s chronicle records beer in offerings, seasonal festivals, funerals and commemorations of the dead.
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