Wine: The Story of the Drink of the Gods

Wine is one of the most beloved drinks in the world. No celebration is complete without it, and on every inhabited continent, people produce and drink what many ancient cultures considered a sacred substance, one holding secrets that stretch back to the beginning of civilisation itself. 

For the gods and rulers of antiquity, life without wine was unimaginable. It carried far more than pleasure: wine accompanied the dead into the afterlife, formed a core ingredient in medicines used to treat disease and wounds, and stood at the centre of religious ritual across the ancient world. To drink wine was to participate in something larger than oneself, a connection to the divine that spanned empires and eras. 

But like any gift attributed to the gods, wine was soon turned to darker purposes. Poisoned wine became one of history’s most effective instruments of power, a quiet weapon deployed in the shadows of palaces and temples. Priests used it to eliminate pharaohs, emperors used it against their closest allies, and allies turned it back on emperors in return. Queens moved against ambitious husbands, and husbands moved against wives who had become inconvenient. Wine, sacred and intoxicating, became just as often an instrument of betrayal as of celebration. 

Yet among all its uses and meanings, one question about wine remains more compelling than any other: where did it begin? The search for wine’s true origin leads to a single country, one named in the Holy Scripture itself as the birthplace of winemaking. From its very earliest history, this nation has been shaped by a deep and enduring cult of the vine, its culture layered with philosophical and religious meaning tied inseparably to wine. 

Archaeologists have gone so far as to describe this country as one vast, ancient winery, the source of a drink so central to human civilisation that no person today, whether they realise it or not, lives untouched by its legacy. What is this country? And how did it come to hold such a singular place in the history of wine? 

WINE: THE STORY OF THE DRINK OF THE GODS sets out to answer these questions, journeying through the ancient world to trace wine’s evolution from sacred ritual to secular pleasure, from healing remedy to political weapon. Along the way, the film uncovers the myths, the murders, and the meanings behind humanity’s oldest and most complex relationship with a single drink, culminating in the story of the civilisation that gave the world its very first vintage. 

From ancient tombs to imperial courts, from religious temples to poisoned goblets, this is the story of how one drink came to define power, faith and betrayal across the ancient world, and how its origins still shape the wine we drink today.