Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

is considered to be part of the wine belt of Europe. Nevertheless, beer, particularly mass-produced

pale lager Pale lager is a very pale-to- golden-colored lager beer with a well- attenuated body and a varying degree of noble hop bitterness. The brewing process for this beer developed in the mid-19th century, when Gabriel Sedlmayr took pale ale brew ...

s, are common in the country. It is traditionally considered to be an ideal accompaniment to pizza; since the 1970s, beer has spread from

pizzeria A pizzeria is a restaurant focusing on pizza. As well as pizza, dishes at pizzerias can include kebab, salads and pasta. Many pizzerias offer take-away, where the customer orders their food either in advance or at the restaurant and then t ...

s and has become much more popular for drinking in other situations. In the seventh century BC in Sicily, the

Phoenicia Phoenicia () was an ancient thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenician city-states extended and shrank throughout their histor ...

ns traded and consumed beer. In

Piedmont it, Piemontese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

Pombia Pombia is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Novara in the Italian region Piedmont, located about northeast of Turin and about north of Novara. The commune is known for its Safari Park, established in 1976. History It has Roman origi ...

Province of Novara Novara (It. ''Provincia di Novara'') is a province in the Piedmont region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Novara. In 1992, the new Province of Verbano-Cusio-Ossola was created through the fusion of three geographical areas which had prev ...

, an archaeological investigation found tombs from the

Golasecca culture The Golasecca culture (9th - 4th century BC) was a Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age culture in northern Italy, whose type-site was excavated at Golasecca in the province of Varese, Lombardy, where, in the area of Monsorino at the beginning of the ...

, including a tomb from 560 BC containing traces of beer.

Ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...

knew of beer and produced small amounts, but the systems of production were destroyed in various barbarian invasions. The first medical school, the

Schola Medica Salernitana The Schola Medica Salernitana ( it, Scuola Medica Salernitana) was a Medieval medical school, the first and most important of its kind. Situated on the Tyrrhenian Sea in the south Italian city of Salerno, it was founded in the 9th century and rose ...

, praised the substance stating that it "supports old age, flows through the veins, increases well-being, and strengthens the blood." On the occasion of his wedding, Ludovico Sforza distributed beer freely to the Milanese. At this time, it was referred to in Florence as "barley wine". The first brewery in Italy, according to Hermes Zampollo, was "Spluga" in Chiavenna, which opened in 1840. However, the company Wührer stated that its brewing commenced in

Brescia Brescia (, locally ; lmo, link=no, label= Lombard, Brèsa ; lat, Brixia; vec, Bressa) is a city and ''comune'' in the region of Lombardy, Northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, a few kilometers from the lakes Garda and Iseo ...

in 1829. The first person in Italy to cultivate hops for beer brewing was in 1847. In 1983, the country consumed of beer. As of 2010, Italy has a beer consumption of per capita per year.

Breweries and brands

One of the oldest and most widespread breweries in Italy is Peroni, today owned by the

Asahi Asahi (朝日, 旭, or あさひ) means "morning sun" in Japanese and may refer to: Cities * Asahi, Chiba (旭市; ''Asahi-shi'') Wards * Asahi-ku, Osaka (旭区; ''Asahi-ku'') * Asahi-ku, Yokohama (旭; ''Asahi-ku'') Towns * Asahi, Aichi (旭� ...

group, which also owns the popular brand

Nastro Azzurro Peroni Brewery () is a brewing company, founded by Francesco Peroni in Vigevano, Italy in 1846. It is probably best known worldwide for its pale lager, ''Nastro Azzurro'' (5.1% ABV), which was the 13th best-selling beer in the United Kingdom in ...

. Other known breweries and beer brands are: * Beba * Birra del Borgo (owned by

InBev InBev () is a brewing company that resulted from the merger between Belgium-based company Interbrew and Brazilian brewer AmBev which took place in 2004. It existed independently until the acquisition of Anheuser-Busch in 2008, which formed Anheus ...

) *

Birra Raffo Raffo was an Italian lager produced from 1919 to 1987 in its homonymous brewery in Taranto. In 1961, the brand was transferred to Peroni which, in turn, belongs to the South African SABMiller. Today, Raffo is produced in the Peroni Brewery in Ro ...

(owned by

) * Birrificio Baladin * Birrificio Italiano * Castello * Dreher (owned by

Heineken Heineken Lager Beer ( nl, Heineken Pilsener), or simply Heineken () is a pale lager beer with 5% alcohol by volume produced by the Dutch brewing company Heineken N.V. Heineken beer is sold in a green bottle with a red star. History On 15 Feb ...

) * Forst * Ichnusa (owned by Heineken) * Menabrea (owned by Forst) * Birrificio Dr. Barbanera * Birra Messina (owned by Heineken) *

Birrificio Lambrate is a craft brewery in the Lambrate district of Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a popul ...

* Birra Morena * Moretti (owned by Heineken) * Opperbacco * Birra Pedavena (owned by Castello) * Peroni (owned by

Breweries and brands

See also

References

Bibliography

External links