Beer is one of the oldest drinks humans have produced,

dating back to at least the 5th millennium BC in Iran, and

was recorded in the written history of ancient Egypt and
Mesopotamia and spread throughout the world.

As almost any cereal containing certain sugars can

undergo spontaneous fermentation due to wild yeasts in
the air, it is possible that beer-like drinks were
independently developed throughout the world soon after
a tribe or culture had domesticated cereal. Chemical tests
of ancient pottery jars reveal that beer was produced as
far back as about 7,000 years ago in what is today
Iran.[2] This discovery reveals one of the earliest known
uses of fermentation and is the earliest evidence of
brewing to date.[3] In Mesopotamia, the oldest eviden ce
of beer is believed to be a 6,000-year-old Sumerian tablet
depicting people consuming a drink through reed straws
from a communal bowl. A 3,900-year-old Sumerian poem
honouring Ninkasi, the patron goddess of brewing,
contains the oldest surviving beer recipe, describing the
production of beer from barley via bread. In China,
residue on pottery dating from around 5,000 years ago
shows beer was brewed using barley and other grains.[4]

The invention of bread and beer has been argued to be

responsible for humanity's ability to develop technology
and build civilization.[5][6][7] The earliest chemically
confirmed barley beer to date was discovered at Godin
Tepe in the central Zagros Mountains of Iran, where
fragments of a jug, from between 5,400 and 5,000 year s
ago was found to be coated with beerstone, a by -product
of the brewing process.[8]
Beer may have been known in Neolithic Europe as far
back as 5,000 years ago,[9] and was mainly brewed on a
domestic scale.[10]

Beer produced before the Industrial Revolu tion continued

to be made and sold on a domestic scale, although by the
7th century AD beer was also being produced and sold by
European monasteries. During the Industrial Revolution,
the production of beer moved from artisanal manufacture
to industrial manufacture, and domestic manufacture
ceased to be significant by the end of the 19th
century.[11] The development of hydrometers and
thermometers changed brewing by allowing the brewer
more control of the process, and greater knowledge of
the results.

Today, the brewing industry is a global business,

consisting of several dominant multinational companies
and many thousands of smaller producers ranging from
brewpubs to regional breweries.[12] More than 133
billion liters (35 billion gallons) are sold per year—
producing total global revenues of $294.5 billion (£147.7
billion) in 2006.[13]