The Römische Wein von Speyer, or Speyer wine, was retrieved from a Roman grave in 1867. Part of the bottle’s success in retaining its liquid contents rests on the fact that it was sealed with wax rather than a cork, which would’ve rotted away long ago setting the “wine” inside loose as it did.
We say “wine” because, over the course of around 1,700 years, the liquid will likely have lost all its alcoholic qualities to the point of forming a different grapey beast altogether. That said, nobody’s yet been able to ascertain for certain what the bottle now contains owing to the fact that, frankly, everyone’s a bit scared to open it.
Aside from the prospect of setting free some wine-dwelling genie variety, the hesitation surrounding cracking open the Speyer wine is because experts aren’t sure if the liquid would survive the ordeal.
“It’s not clear what would happen if air gets into the wine,” said Ludger Tekampe, who heads the department responsible for storing it, to The Local. According to Tekampe, despite the bottle’s incredible age “the content is remarkably stable.”
A thick layer of olive oil meant to preserve the bottle’s contents has clearly worked well here, which apparently accounts for more of the liquid in the bottle than the actual wine. Trust the Romans to plus up the decadence of wine with an inordinate measure of rich fatty olive oil.
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