A 2,000-year-old Roman funerary urn unearthed in southern Spain has been shown to contain the oldest wine ever found still in liquid form.
Discovered during home renovations at a property in Carmona in 2019, the contents of the urn were analyzed by a team of scientists from the University of Cordoba in a study published Monday.
Study lead author José Rafael Ruiz Arrebola, a professor of organic chemistry at the university, told CNN that the urn was found to contain cremated remains, burned ivory thought to come from a funeral pyre and around 4.5 liters (1.2 gallons) of reddish liquid.
“When the archaeologists opened the urn we almost froze,” he said. “It was very surprising.”
The team then carried out a chemical analysis of the liquid and found that it was wine.
This was a big surprise, because wine normally evaporates quickly and is chemically unstable, Ruiz Arrebola said.
