The maps, seen together, illustrate well the expansion of salt-mining through time. The chapter ends with a short mention of the best-known spice that originated in the New World, the chili pepper, the use of which goes back to at least 7000 BC in Mexico. After the various components of food, the authors turn their attention to the need for liquids. The evidence strongly attests that people from earliest times were not content to simply satisfy their thirst with water, but that they searched for and developed skills to produce fermented drinks. The authors speculate that the fermented drinks of the Old and the New Worlds represent independent discoveries, as do the rice-based fermented drinks of Asia.
Natural fermentation requires high sugar content.
Honey, being pure sugar, may have been the basis of the oldest fermented drink, mead. Beer brewing must have followed closely the production of cereal crops. Not all drinks concocted by humans were alcoholic, but most had stimulant properties. To end the chapter on drinks, the authors discuss the early histories of tea, coffee and cocoa. The Brothwells' 1969 book ends with a chapter on diet and disease.