Strabo believed that barley beer was a drink peculiar to the Egyptians, and the cultivation of beer was attributed to Osiris by Didorus Siculus. An inscription dating from 2200 BCE says, "The mouth of a perfectly contented man is filled with beer." And beer formed part of the traditional Egyptian offering formula, "O you who give bread and beer to beneficent souls in the house of Osiris, do you give bread and beer at the two periods to the soul of N who is with you." We read that the bread and the beer of Osiris make the eater immortal, (Book of the Dead, 40) an idea which is frequently elaborated. In the Pyramid Text of Teta, Osiris Teta "receives thy bread which decayeth not, and thy beer which perisheth not." In the Text of Pepi II, the aspirant prays for "thy bread of eternity, and thy beer of everlastingness. (390)
Although wine is the drink usually associated with Dionysos, we find beer connected with him as well through his allonymns Sabazius and Bromios. Sabazius was the Thracian-Phrygian form of Dionysos, a wild, bearded God of fertility, snakes, and ritual ecstacy, whose followers attained union with him by drinking seba, beer, much as Dionysos' followers drank wine. Additionally, the Emperor Julian wrote a rather witty epigram upon discovering 'wine made from barley', that is beer, found in Gaul:
"Who are you, and whence, Dionysos? For by the true Bacchus, I do not recognize you: I know only the son of Zeus. He smells of nectar, you smell of the goat. Truly the Celts must have made you from grain only for lack of grapes. Therefore we should call you Demetrios, not Dionysos. rather born of grain [than of fire], and Bromos, not Bromios" (Epigram IX, 638 Greek Anthology )
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