hist-brewing: definition of brewing

[Laura Barrowman]

For all of the crazy things Scadians get arguing about... Cordials are 
covered under the Brewing heading because they contain alcohol.  SCA has 
a special policy governing the involvement of alcoholic beverages in 
competition.  If the rules are not followed we endanger the "Insurance 
Policy" - that nifty thing that allows the SCA to have fighting.  All 
Scadians know we    "must......protect....insurance....policy" with our 
dying breath.  Heck, if someone could prove those chocolates with 
cordials in them are period, I'd be inclined to include them in the 
Brewers Guild if it meant they would turn up in competitions.  Mmmmmm. 
Chocolate and beer.

I tried looking up brewing in the dictionary.  One volume I have only 
says "to make beer from malt and hops by boiling, infusion and 
germination".  Hmmmm... didn't think you could germinate malt.  That 
must have been the one I got for 99 cents.  So I go to my monster 
Webster's Unabridged.  I won't bore you all with the many definitions of 
brew but one in particular does stand out "to concoct, to mix".  I think 
that one definitely covers cordial making.

I have always thought that to brew meant one made beer but Webster has 
proved me wrong.

Margret des Kranenturm