My aunt told me earlier that one of my favorite beers is brewed using water which flows through a graveyard.
Now, while drinking said beer, I can’t stop thinking about how I might be drinking corpse water
Am I worried about nothing?
My aunt told me earlier that one of my favorite beers is brewed using water which flows through a graveyard.
Now, while drinking said beer, I can’t stop thinking about how I might be drinking corpse water
Am I worried about nothing?
Comments
Probably. Things like leaded coffins, etc. are what I’d be most concerned about. As to organic corpse effluent, the fermentation process will pretty well neutralize any bacteria or viruses present therein.
So in college I actually did a semi-formal study of this as part of an internship! The cemetery I was working in is about 200 years old at high elevation with water nearby so I had the same concerns. There are thousands of plots that were interred before the use of lead and arsenic was banned in embalming fluid. Along with whatever people were using for casket material. We took soil cores at several plots varying by age and elevation. We tested for lead and arsenic and found that the levels were no higher than in our control site at a public park of similar size about a mile away, so if heavy metals and other toxins are leeching into the soil, it’s doing so incredible, incredibly slowly.
Maybe on occasion, the graves could leak embalming fluids or something, but the bigger issue is fertilizer runoff and eutrophication of nearby waterways for cemeteries that like to have green, lush lawns.
new regulations prohibit embalmed corpses to be burried. Only cremation allowed.
The Aldgate Pump in London was locally famous in the c19th for having a bright, mineral taste that was much nicer than the other local pump – It was later discovered that its watercourse ran through multiple overstuffed-to-overflowing graveyards, and it had much higher than usual calcium levels, from the water leaching calcium from the bones.
maybe im wrong but i feel like any place thats doing distribution of any food or drink is going to be filtering its ingredients, particularly water, pretty rigorously.
again, im not an expert, but RO filtration removes essentially everything, its virtually pure water, i would guess most places are using something that is somewhat similar in quality to an RO filter. i mean… i have one in my house so its not like its some space age shit thats totally inaccessible but i could see it being difficult to scale so maybe they use something else, idk… but theyre definitely not just scooping water out of a crick and making beer with it lol
What beer?
Historically, yes. Aldgate Pump in London was once praised for its great tasting and sparkly water. This was later found to be because the pump feed was leeching minerals from adjoining graveyards, and yes, eventually people started getting very sick.
Yes but so do golf courses and such. Water is generally poorly maintained
I once read something about the Bronte sisters (the literary authors from the 1800s), and how they all died young of potential contamination from years of drinking well water that was contaminated from a nearby cemetery.
Edit: Found the article that I had read.
Eichbaum from Manheim?
Tangent- we have a horse farm and they drop dead occasionally. We’ve buried 10 or so very deep. I’m not the horse person- my wife is, but I seem to remember there was an environmental contamination concern due to all the junk they accumulate in their bodies getting into the ground water. Luckily a horse cremetatorium opened nearby and they pick up the bodies now.
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I have a Master’s in Geological Engineering. Short answer: yes.
I was beginning to lose faith in the internet. Thought it was dead. Then a simple question like this comes along and restores my faith.
Great question!