Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 37, Number 4, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 January 1905 — Yeast Used by Ancients. [ARTICLE]

Yeast Used by Ancients.

The yeast employed by the ancients in making bread was probably of the same kind as the Israelites of the days of the great Pharaoh the oppressor used, calling it “leaven.” This was what is known nowadays as a wild yeast, its germs or spores being afloat everywhere in the air. A bit of dough was preserved out of each batch prepared for the ovens, and when tills was added to the next dough the yeast contained in it quickly spread through the whole, only a little being required to “leaven the whole lump.” But when the people of Israel were wandering in the wilderness they did not always have yeast handy, and so were obliged to eat unleavened bread. The best examples of old Roman bread have been found at Pompeii, a town that was destroyed by an eruption of Vesuvius in tbe year 79 A. D. Forty-eight loaves were dug out of one bakeshop. These spec) meats markedly resembled those found in the Egyptian tombs and were originally composed of ground barley. The ancient cliff dwellers of the Southwest raised Indian corn and made their bread of it. Once in a while a loaf of it is discovered in one of their deserted houses, and speculation is naturally indulged as te the degree of its antiquity. Perhaps it is 300 or 500 years old. In that extremely dry climate it has hot decayed.