Dr. Patrick McGovern, who transformed archaeology by proving that recreating prehistoric drinks could unlock secrets of ancient civilizations, passed away August 24 from prostate cancer complications at his Pennsylvania home.
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Revolutionary Approach to Ancient Studies
McGovern’s unconventional career began with a simple belief: that fermented beverages held the key to understanding how ancient peoples lived, celebrated, and built their societies. This philosophy led him to establish what scholars now call “drinkology” – the scientific study of historical alcohol consumption.
Working from his laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania‘s Penn Museum, where he directed the Biomolecular Archaeology Project for Cuisine, Fermented Beverages and Health, McGovern developed techniques to extract and analyse microscopic residues from pottery shards, bronze vessels, and broken bottles spanning millennia.
Ancient Recipes Come to Life
The breakthrough that defined McGovern’s legacy came not just from discovering ancient beverages, but from bringing them back to life. His recreation of a 2,700-year-old drink from King Midas’s tomb sparked a movement that would eventually reach commercial markets.
The process began in 2000 when McGovern challenged microbrewery owners at a Penn Museum dinner to recreate the Midas beverage – a complex mixture of barley beer, grape wine, and honey mead. Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head Craft Brewery won the competition, and the resulting “Midas Touch” beer became commercially available.
“These drinks reflect how our species has developed on this planet — by taking whatever we can in nature and making it into something really good,” McGovern explained.
Record-Breaking Discoveries
McGovern’s research yielded several world records. In China, he identified a 9,000-year-old fermented beverage made from rice, honey, and hawthorn fruit – believed to be humanity’s oldest known alcoholic drink. In Georgia’s South Caucasus region, he discovered evidence of grape wine production dating to 6,000-5,800 B.C.
His work revealed alcohol’s central role in ancient societies, from Egyptian pyramid workers receiving daily beer rations to religious ceremonies across cultures. “For the pyramids, each worker got a daily ration of four to five litres,” he noted. “The pyramids might not have been built if there hadn’t been enough beer.”
A Life Between Science and Humanities
Born December 9, 1944, in Corpus Christi, Texas, McGovern’s intellectual journey reflected his diverse interests. After studying chemistry at Cornell University in 1966, he explored neurochemistry, sacred theology, and divinity before earning his archaeology doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania in 1980.
“I could never really resolve whether I wanted to do science or humanities,” he reflected in 2012, describing archaeology as the perfect fusion of both worlds.
McGovern, who earned the nickname “Indiana Jones of ancient alcohol” for his adventurous research, is survived by his wife Doris Nordmeier, whom he married in 1972, and brother George. His legacy lives on through commercial beverages still produced using his ancient recipes and through the field of biomolecular archaeology he helped establish.
Featured image
Source: Alison Dunlap/Penn Museum Philadelphia
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