This fall the Classics Department is looking forward to some amazing lectures on campus! One of our visitors, Brandeis University Professor of Classics and Chemistry Andrew Koh, is featured in the August 27th online issue of Time magazine for his work on understanding the flavor profiles of ancient wine. Working at a palace site in modern Israel, Koh observes:

“In the past,” says Koh, lead author of a paper describing the discovery in the latest issue of the journal PLOS One,“we wouldn’t have been able to say much more than ‘this is a bunch of containers that held wine.’”

Thanks to an unprecedentedly sophisticated analysis of the deposits inside those containers, however, Koh, who has a joint appointment in Brandeis’ Classical Studies and Chemistry Departments, along with two colleagues, can conclude much more, specifically that the wine was flavored with — deep breath, now — honey, storax resin, terebinth resin, cedar oil, cyperus, juniper and possibly mint, myrtle and cinnamon as well….

See Andrew Koh speak about his methods and discoveries at Trinity on October 16th!