Women have been active in brewing since ancient times. From the earliest evidence of brewing in 7000 BCE, until the commercialization of brewing during industrialization, women were the primary brewers on all inhabited continents. In many cultures, the deities, goddesses and protectors of brewers were female entities who were associated with fertility.
From the middle of the 18th century, women had roles as barmaids, pub operators, bottlers or secretaries for breweries. In less industrialized areas, they produced homebrews and traditional alcoholic beverages. From the mid-20th century, women began working as chemists for brewing establishments. Beginning in the 1960s and 1970s, they began re-entering the field as brewers.
History Ethnographic studies and archaeological records indicate that, until the industrialization of brewing began, brewing beer was primarily an activity engaged in by women. From the 18th century onwards, women were increasingly employed as barmaids, and particularly in Australia as "publicans" or licensees running hotels selling alcohol. By the 19th century, few women were employed in brewing with the exception of labor for auxiliary functions, such as bottling and secretarial posts. In the 20th century, women began to work in a limited capacity in laboratories, but aside from a few exceptions such as Susannah Oland in Canada, women were excluded from directing brewing operations. Professional female brewers in Western society before the trade became "masculinized", were referred to as "brewsters".
In Chinese legend, Yi Di, is credited with making the first alcohol from rice grains. In some accounts Yi Di is the wife of Yu the Great, sometimes a servant of Yu's daughter, sometimes a medical man who created liquor to cure "disorders". A female divine being in Ainu mythology known as Kamui Fuchi was the protector of brewing; brewers prayed to her and offered libations to ensure the warding off of evil spirits which might spoil the batch. Women in both Japan and Taiwan in the modern age engage in chewing rice to begin the fermentation process for making alcohol.
In ancient Sumeria, brewing was the only profession that was "watched over by a female deity", namely Ninkasi. A tablet found dating back to 1800 BCE contains the Hymn to Ninkasi which is also basically a recipe for Mesopotamian beer. Sumerian beer was made from bappir, a bread made from twice-baked barley, which was then fermented. In ancient Babylon, women worked as baker-brewers and were often engaged in the commercial distribution of beer. Archaeologists believe that the Sumerians and Babylonians were responsible for spreading brewing processes into Africa. Brewing in ancient Egypt followed a method similar to Sumerian beer, often using the same dough as a base for both beer and bread. Brewing was considered the province of Egyptian women, "especially the steps of grinding the grain and straining the mash". The goddess Hathor was considered to have invented brewing and Hathor's temple at Dendera was known as "the place of drunkenness". Another Egyptian goddess, Tenenet, was worshiped as beer's deity and hieroglyphics on tombs depict images of women both brewing and drinking the beverage. Other African societies also credited women with creating beer. For example, the Zulu fertility goddess, Nomkhubulwane, is revered for her invention, as is the Dogon deity, Yasigi, who is often depicted dancing with a beer ladle to symbolize her role of distributing the beer made by women in ceremonial gatherings. Women in Burkina Faso have been making mash of fermented sorghum into beer for some 5,500 years. In Tanzania, both women and men help harvest and create different kinds of brew, including ulanzi and pombe. Women in Tanzania have traditionally been the "sole marketers" of drinks, and many use the money they make by selling alcohol to supplement their incomes.
As early as 1600 BCE, Maya civilizations were using cacao beans to produce beer, long before it was used to make the non-alcoholic cocoa. Though actual production methods are unknown, Friar Landa described the process of preparing beverages as involving grinding maize and cacao to a paste before adding liquids and spices. Agriculture was within man's realm in the Mayan world, but food preparation belonged to women. On an ancient ceramic vase, chocolate preparation shows a woman pouring the substance between two vessels to create the highly desired foam favored by the Maya. Pre-Columbian Andean women chewed maize (occasionally using cassava or quinoa) to break down the starch and then spit it out to begin fermentation. Chicha, the resulting drink, is still widely available in Latin America. In the Wari Empire, archaeological evidence has indicated that elite Wari women brewers ran the breweries and that tradition carried forward into Incan society. Throughout the Andean region and Mesoamerica, women were the chief producers of alcoholic beverages. During the 15th century in Peru, women's lives among the Xauxa people of the Upper Mantaro Valley were changed by the process of producing chicha. After the Xauxa were conquered by the Inca, women were forced to work harder to produce more alcohol. In Mexico, a female deity, "Mayahuel" was revered among the Aztec for having discovered how to extract agave sap for the manufacture of pulque. After the Spanish invasion, women in Brazil and Mexico, as well as throughout Andean territories, became not only producers of alcoholic beverages, but also its main market vendors.
Traditional Germanic societies were reported by the Romans to drink ale, made predominantly of fermented honey, produced by women. Until monasteries took over the production of alcoholic beverages in the 11th century, making it a profession for monks and nuns, brewing was the domain of tribal Germanic women. Migratory Germanic tribe women typically brewed their meads and ales in the forest, to avoid pillages by invaders. Their beverages did not contain hops, which were first recommended as an additive by St. Hildegard of Bingen. Because hops served as a preservative, beer's suitability for consumption became longer, though the addition of hops also increased the cost of brewing. In the decades before the Black Death in Europe, many households required a large amount of ale, because of a lack of potable water and expense of other beverages. Women used the opportunity of brewing to make extra money at home. In Brigstock, some women obtained licenses to brew over several months. Women in northern England were the main brewers for the community. As elsewhere in Europe, the founding of guilds often forced women out of the brewing industry; however, in Haarlem in the Netherlands, because women were allowed to inherit guild membership from spouses, many continued in the profession. Data collected on the period between 1518 and 1663, showed that 97 brewsters, three-quarters of whom were widows, were operating among a total of 536 brewers in the city.
For around a thousand years in Finland, women brewsters created a beer called sahti in villages throughout the country. The recipe usually contained hops, juniper twigs, and barley and rye grains which had been malted and then smoked in a sauna. Finnish legends include the story of Louhi in the Kalevala, a woman who brewed beer by mixing bear's saliva with honey. Raugutiene, was a Baltic and Slavic goddess, who was the protector of beer. Alan D. Eames, a beer anthropologist, wrote an article in 1993 stating that the Norse Vikings, allowed only women to brew their ale. Archaeologists have uncovered graves of pre-Viking Nordic people which indicate that women were the ones who made and served alcohol. In the grave of the "Egtved Girl", a bucket of grog buried at her feet showed that the drink was made from a mixture of wheat, rye and barley as a base and included cranberries, honey, and lingonberries, as well as herbs, including birch resin, bog myrtle, juniper, and yarrow, to spice the drink. Danish women were the primary brewers until the establishment of guilds in the Middle Ages. While guilds controlled production for the crown and military, as well as for those in cities, women continued to be the primary brewers in the countryside. Even within the guilds, while higher positions were occupied by men, many of their wives held lower positions; in addition, there is evidence to suggest that the majority of the brewing performed by these families was carried out by the wives. Beer was supplied to Temple Newsam, Yorkshire, by local woman Elizabeth Pease for over thirty years, during the eighteenth century (1728-1758). Pease brewed ale, strong beer, table beer, and small beer; however, because she brewed seasonally, her income was inconsistent and she was quite poor.
During the 16th and 17th centuries, brewing in Europe changed from being mainly small scale operations by solo women or groups of monks to being mainly large scale commercial operations involving large numbers of men; although women were still involved in the sale of beer. As women were forced out of brewing, the creation of a new ideology about women brewers took place which included "the construction of women as incapable of brewing; the link of this construction to the witch; and the position of widows as both brewers and ale-sellers". Popular depictions of alewives described them as witch-like, untrustworthy, corrupt and grotesque. In Ballad on an Ale-Seller, John Lydgate describes an alewife "who uses her charms to induce men to drink". The alewife in the popular poem The Tunning of Elynour Rummyng by John Skelton, is "strikingly vicious and nasty". Other depictions of alewives in England showed them "condemned to eternal punishment in hell". However, "it is difficult to tell whether alewives or women who brewed beer were accused of witchcraft directly.".
Women of Native American societies in North America including the Apache, Maricopa, Pima, and Tohono O'odham brewed a Saguaro cactus beer or wine, called tiswin for rituals. Apache women also produced a product made from corn, which was similar to Mexican beers, known as tulpi or tulapa which was used in girls' puberty rites. The puberty ceremony includes four days of prayer, fasting, consumption of ritual food and drink, and runs dedicated to the White Painted Lady, an Apache deity. The Coahuiltecan and other tribes from their Texas vicinity made an intoxicant from yucca and the red beans of the mountain laurel.
In the North American colonies women continued with homebrewing which, for at least a century, was the predominant means of beer production. While Thomas Jefferson may have been famous for his brewing, Martha Jefferson was equally renowned for her wheat beer. The first commercial brewster in the Thirteen Colonies was Mary Lisle, who inherited her father's brewery in 1734 and operated it until 1751. In 1713, Elizabeth and John Haddon built a three-story brick mansion called New Haddonfield Plantation, where Elizabeth Haddon managed the family property and her husband tended to his missionary journeys; the Brew House she built in 1713 still stands in the backyard. Although the first recorded commercial female brewer in the Colonies was Mary Lisle, who inherited her father's Philadelphia brewpub in 1734, there is reason to believe that across the river in South Jersey, Haddon was running a more-than-average homebrew operation.
In Canada, Susannah Oland, an Englishwoman who immigrated to Canada in 1865, and her husband established a popular brewery called the Navy and Army Brewery. After her husband died, Oland established a brewery of her own, though she concealed her gender by naming the business "S. Oland Sons and Company," using her initials to hide the fact that she was a woman. She was the creator of a beer recipe which became the basis for founding Canada's oldest independent brewery, Moosehead Brewery.