Anthropologists and archaeologists believe that the first humans ever to make the great leap from a nomadic and tribal into a civilized and sedentary existence were the Sumerians, some eight to ten thousand years ago.

The Sumerians are considered the world's first builders, farmers, and writers - and, as we know from archaeological finds, probably the first brewers, too. Beer was at the center of their religious rituals. Their highest deity was the goddess of beer and fertility. It is a measure of the importance of beer in Sumerian society that eventually about half their grain ended up in their brews.

The Sumerians' ingenuity and wealth soon became a magnet for other, non-brewing, people around them.

This is the official story of the demise of the Sumerians and the Babylonian take-over

The Babylonians continued the Sumerian tradition of making beer, yet they could not leave well alone.

The Babylonians were the first to institute beer regulation.