Jun 1, 2020
Do you know the origin of the word “whiskey”? Turns out we have Scotland to thank for not only the drink we know as whiskey today, but the word we use to describe it as well. The earliest record of whiskey on paper happens in 1494 with a reference to aqua vitae in the Exchequer Rolls, but there was a great interest--and a good deal of illicit smuggling of Scotch whiskey-- happening not just in Shakespeare's lifetime, but under the title "aqua vitae" (which is used no less than 6 times in Shakespeare's plays), the beverage was also hugely popular for centuries prior to Shakespeare’s life in the Catholic Church as a kind of holy water. After the Dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII, the monks with skills in distillery went underground to create whiskey, and in so doing formed one of the largest illegal operations in Europe. You may have thought all of the parodies of drunken friars like Friar Tuck from the Robin Hood tales, and in similar way, even Shakespeare’s own Falstaff, may have been merely jokes for a story, but as our guest this week, Rosie Wilmot of the Scotch Whisky Association in Edinburgh Scotland is here to share with you today, these stories and aqua vitae, in particular, have a real historical basis directly from the life of William Shakespeare.