Mixing Wine with Water

The Greek and Roman Practice of Dilution

Wine dilution was standard practice throughout the Hellenistic and Roman world. The Greeks considered drinking akratos (unmixed wine) the mark of a barbarian. Greek symposium etiquette required that wine be mixed with water in a large bowl (krater) before being poured into individual cups. The proper ratio was actively debated: Hesiod's Works and Days recommended three parts water to one of wine; the physician Hippocrates used different dilutions for different medical purposes; symposium guests might choose a ratio by vote at the beginning of the evening. A ratio of one to three (wine to water) was considered relatively restrained for a dinner party, while two to one was more festive.

Roman practice adapted the Greek custom, using a similar mixing-bowl (crater) and similar ratios. Roman wines were often highly concentrated - the best wines could be reduced by evaporation or by allowing partial fermentation to stop early, producing thick, sweet, high-alcohol products that required substantial dilution to be drinkable as a table wine. Pliny the Elder (Natural History 14.28) discusses multiple wine varieties and their appropriate dilution ratios, treating the question as a matter of sophisticated knowledge.

The Significance of Unmixed Wine

Drinking undiluted wine was associated with barbarians, heavy drinkers, and ritual excess. The Scythians, famous to Greek authors for drinking wine straight, became a stereotype of uncivilized alcohol consumption. Yet some contexts called for concentrated wine: medicinal use (diluted wine as antiseptic was standard ancient medicine), mourning rituals (concentrated wine was offered to the bereaved), and some religious ceremonies.

Proverbs 23:29-35 includes the most vivid biblical warning against excessive wine, describing the wine-drinker who 'goes to look at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup and goes down smoothly.' This image suggests concentrated, appealing wine - the kind that tempts by its appearance before one considers its effects. The warning is against the wine's seductive quality precisely because the product being described was desirable.

Archaeological Evidence

Krater (mixing bowl) shapes appear in the pottery assemblages of Hellenistic-period Palestinian sites, confirming that Greek-style wine service had been adopted by the Levantine elite. Ceramic analysis of wine vessels from multiple sites has identified wine residues and, in some cases, evidence of resin additives used to preserve wine, consistent with the concentrated wine products that would require dilution before serving.

The wine trade amphora assemblages recovered from Mediterranean shipwrecks and coastal sites confirm the concentration of ancient wine commerce in the specific wine types that required dilution: the heavy, rich wines of Cos, Chios, and other Aegean islands were premium products valued precisely for their concentrated character.

Biblical Passages

Proverbs 9:2 describes Wisdom preparing her feast: 'She has slaughtered her beasts; she has mixed her wine; she has also set her table.' The mixing of wine is presented as a sign of proper hospitality preparation - the wine is ready because it has been diluted to the appropriate ratio for guests. Isaiah 1:22 laments that 'your silver has become dross, your best wine mixed with water' - here the mixing is a metaphor for corruption and adulteration: something that was pure has been weakened by addition of too much water.

When Paul warns Corinthian believers about drunkenness at the Lord's Supper in 1 Corinthians 11:20-21 ('one goes hungry, another gets drunk'), the concern is real and specific: wealthy Corinthians were consuming enough wine to become intoxicated while poorer members received nothing. The context of communal dining in a Greco-Roman setting makes the concern concrete: the wealthy arrivals were eating their own food and drinking wine without waiting for poorer members who arrived later from their work. The social inequality of the Roman dinner party - where guests of different status received different food and wine quantities - had invaded the Christian communal meal.

Revelation 14:10 uses undiluted wine as a metaphor for divine wrath: 'he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength (akratou) into the cup of his anger.' The Greek akratos specifically means unmixed - the opposite of properly diluted table wine. This is the most concentrated, potent form of the substance. The image uses Greek cultural coding: as unmixed wine was excessive, dangerous, and appropriate only for extraordinary situations, so God's undiluted wrath represents a measure of judgment beyond ordinary proportion.

Dead Sea Scrolls Evidence

The Community Rule (1QS 6:4-5) describes the communal blessing over wine at Qumran meals. The Damascus Document (CD 12:1-2) addresses wine purity standards and handling. The Qumran community's concern with wine purity would have involved careful attention to dilution as well as origin and handling - improperly diluted wine at a communal religious meal could have been seen as a violation of the meal's sacred character.

Parallel Cultures

Egyptian medical papyri (Ebers Papyrus, Edwin Smith Papyrus) use diluted wine extensively as a medicinal carrier for other substances - the diluted wine was the vehicle for herbal remedies, topical treatments, and wound cleansing. Mesopotamian administrative records document wine distributions in measured quantities, with different qualities distributed to different ranks of recipient. The consistent appearance of measured wine distributions in administrative records across multiple ancient cultures reflects the economic and ritual significance of wine as a measured, controlled commodity.

Scholarly Sources

The ISBE article on 'Wine and Strong Drink' covers dilution practice in biblical context. For the Greco-Roman symposium context, Oswyn Murray's edited volume Sympotica: A Symposium on the Symposion (1990) provides comprehensive coverage. For Paul's Corinthian meal context, Peter Lampe's study 'The Corinthian Eucharistic Dinner Party' in Affirmation 4:2 (1991) provides detailed social-historical analysis.

Modern Misconceptions

The wine dilution practice is sometimes raised to argue that ancient wine was either so weak as to produce no intoxication (requiring gallons to get drunk) or that dilution was intended specifically to prevent drunkenness. Both overstate the case. Ancient wines could be highly concentrated before dilution, and even at two-to-one ratios they carried significant alcohol content. Dilution was primarily a cultural practice signaling civilization and propriety, not primarily a safety measure. The point was not that diluted wine couldn't cause drunkenness - it clearly could, as Paul's Corinthian warning confirms - but that drinking undiluted wine was outside the bounds of civilized behavior.

• ISBE: Wine and Strong Drink
• Freeman, Manners and Customs of the Bible, pp.137-140
• Matthews, Manners and Customs of the Bible, p.81