Talk:Beer

probably incorrect date

The article says: "What they did not contain was hops, as that was a later addition, first mentioned in Europe around 822 by a Carolingian Abbot and again in 1067 by abbess Hildegard of Bingen."

Hildegard von Bingen was only born in 1098. German Wikipedia talks about her writings on hops here https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echter_Hopfen#Geschichte not giving an exact date but saying "12th century".

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echter_Hopfen has a quote from her work "physica": „putredines prohibet in amaritudine sua" (its bitterness prevents foulness) which was written between 1150 and 1160 according to https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physica

So I think the date of 1067 is quite obviously an error or typo. Thank you for your attention. ~2026-37387-84 (talk) 18:41, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

Fixed. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:43, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

Lead image

An editor has repeatedly reinserted an image of a woman "in a dirndl" at the Oktoberfest, holding a beer, and they have now reverted two different editors to try to get their way. While that image does show mugs of beer, its focus is at least as much the woman's appearance (including her dirndl), not to mention the Oktoberfest itself, which is the subject of its own article, and illustrated in the 'Society and culture' section of this article. I suggest therefore that an Oktoberfest image is clearly WP:UNDUE for this article, and especially for the lead section. I note that it is a featured image, but that does not unfortunately make it more relevant to this article. I note too that the image proposed by SilkTork is not a specially good photograph: we do not require featured quality for the purposes of this article, but the chosen image should obviously be of a reasonable standard. I suggest we pick a neutral image whose subject is unquestionably "Beer" rather than attractive young women, dirndls, or festivals, for simple relevance (though WP:DECORATIVE hovers in the background). Some images from the many on Commons (in no particular order) that could work for this article include:

• 
  A
• 
  B
• 
  C
• 
  D
• 
  E
• 
  F

Other options are clearly possible. Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:53, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

A is just a glass with some foam at the bottom. B is good. C is bad quality—the beer tap is centered and in focus while the beer itself is minute and off-center. D is way too low res. E is poorly composed. The beer glasses in F are out of focus. Here are my submissions:

• 
  G
• 
  H
• 
  I
• 
  J

-- Veggies (talk) 14:27, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

G is largely distractional (see above in this thread). H, I, and J are wholly static without activity; H gives much attention to brown worktop and brick wall; I cuts off the front glass; J has multiple near-identical part-filled glasses. At the moment, B seems the favoured image. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:13, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

This is the original uncropped photo plus a better quality version of the cropped image:

• 
  Original
• 
  Improved quality crop

Both images have a number of interesting features in that they include Rauchbier, a traditional smoked beer, brewed by Schlenkerla, a renowned historic brewpub, being drawn from a cask into a beer glass. They are not merely decorative, they are interesting and informative, and invite readers to explore further. The cropped image has been used in the article since at least January 2006, and has been the lead image since at least Oct 2008. The main image has the main flaw of the suggested beer festival image in that the person dominates the image, and so distracts from the beer, which is the article topic. Therefore the cropped version is better. Now that we have an improved quality version of the cropped version, that should at least be in consideration for being the main image. SilkTork (talk) 16:50, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

If the hairy arms are a problem (and I'm not a fan of them myself), the image could be cropped to cut them out - as here: GravityCask cropped. SilkTork (talk) 16:56, 29 August 2026 (UTC)