A Whist Of Whisky

The waters of life come in various guises and tastes

- Edwin Soon

If you enjoy scotch, utter the words “uisge beatha”, and you will promptly be served a glass of whisky, at least in a Gaelic tavern. It means ‘water of life’ and in its abbreviated and corrupted form, ‘uis-ge’ sounds like, and means whisky. The vernacular came about because of its seemingly remarkable restorative effects. All ‘waters of life’—whether the French ‘eau de vie’ or the Latin ‘aqua vitae’ or whisky—is a product of the distillation of cereals or grain. (Not to be confused with beer and wine which are obtained by the process of fermentation).

While the term ‘Scotch’ has become almost synonymous with whisky, one might be forgiven in thinking that whisky had its beginnings in Scotland, providing sheep farmers in the cold highlands with a warm and lively breath. However, historical records show that distillation was in fact, developed as far back as 3000 BC by the Arabs and the Chinese. In fact the word alcohol came from the Arab word ‘al-kool’.

IRISH BEGINNINGS

The ancient cultures, however, were more interested in the creation of perfumes from flowers and plants—distillation concentrated the essences of flowers. Legend has it that the art of distillation arrived in Europe with the Celts. But whisky, the art of distillation of malt liquor, appears to have been brought by Saint Patrick from Germany to Ireland. This happened in the 6 th century when Irish monks acquired the secret of distillation. The Irish were therefore the first to produce whisky from grain.