The history of bread

It is conjectured that people might have enjoyed first bread 15,000 years ago. Of course, this happened a little bit later in Lithuania. Still, once it found its way into the Lithuanian culture, bread gained a central and revered position in our culinary tradition.

Obviously, there are no written sources to document the first bite of bread, although scientists say that bread existed over 15,000 years ago. Of course, it consisted of hard lumps of a baked mass of grain, yet these were the predecessors of the bread we have today.

An unknown painter depicted the entire bread making process on the wall of a Pharaoh’s tomb 5,000 years ago. In Switzerland, we can see the oldest loaf of bread in the world that was found at the bottom of a lake. It was made 6,000 years ago.

The ancient Egyptians were the first to become aware of the nutritional value of bread and that happened some 5,000 – 6,000 years ago. The Egyptians already knew how to ferment bread. The Greeks took over this method from the Egyptians and treated the contestants and guests of the first Olympic games to a special delicacy – white fluffy bread. And one of the bread artisans of Ancient Rome, Marcus Vergilius Eurysaces had a 13-metre monument erected, which survives to this day.

Our ancestors are known to have started making bread, which was pure rye bread, back in the Neolithic Era. Written sources say that when the Crusaders invaded Prussia, people had already been making extremely delicious bread and pastries from wheat dough. However, harder times called for inferior bread made of non-winnowed rye. Also, in times of famine people would make bread from chaff, various herbs, their seeds and roots.

In Pagan times and later on bread would be sacrificed to Gabija, the Goddess of Fire, Žemynėlė, the Goddess of the Earth, and water deities. Pagans would grind a brass statue of the "Idol of Bread". It used to be a bun-shaped stone that people would kiss and use as a medicine for various illnesses.

For a number of years in our country, as well as elsewhere, bread would be baked in fireplace ash, on coal, flat stones and pits. For a long time bread would be home-made both by peasants and many townspeople. Private bakeries would eventually emerge in larger towns where bread would be baked for market. The number of such bakeries increased in the middle of the 19th century.