In ancient times, people thought you should drink wine promptly after it came from the vineyards. The idea of wine improving with age never occurred to them.

Mesopotamia - 5400 BC

This is the ancient city where many scientists believe the history of wine storage began. Their proof lies in a wine jar found at the site of Hajji Firuz Temple in the northern Zagros Mountains of Mesopotamia.

The people of this 'cradle of civilization', the Sumerians, noticed that if you put wine in a plugged jar and put it away for a while, it actually tasted better when it was consumed later on. They made their wine from grapes and dates. They lived in an area geographically located between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, an area now known as Iraq, Western Iran, and Eastern Syria.

The Sumerians loved their wine and beer; so much so that they were both used in social and religious events. In their culture, being drunk in public was no big deal; in fact their religious stories included gods being drunk. Two of their gods were named after their love of intoxicating beverages: Goddess Geshtin, "The lady of the Vine," and Goddess Ninkasi, "Lady who fills the mouth."

Egypt (3100-2890 B.C.)

Remnants of wine storage containers have been dated to this First Dynasty of Egypt. During this period of time, people created a lot of pictures that depicted the wine making process and the workers involved it. Wine was such an important part of their culture that these pictures were hung on the walls of their homes and churches.

In those days there were two stages of the wine making process; the crushing for the free run and the following pressing. Between these two stages is where the fermentation process occurred.

The wine then was put into wine storage containers known as amphorae. These amphorae were actually large pottery vessels with spouts, used for bulk storage and transporting the wine. After the final fermentation process had taken place inside these amphorae, they were plugged with stoppers of cloth, leather, cork, or fired clay, then sealed with mortar.

Greeks and Romans

Unfortunately much of their information about wine storage was lost during the fall of the Roman Empire. We do know that these people used corks for wine storage so effectively, that 150 year old bottles were consumed by Emperors at special occasions.

14th to 16th Century

Wine storage in Europe became very important during this period of time because it was almost impossible to find safe drinking water throughout the continent. People drank wine as a replacement beverage.