File Photo (Xinhua)

LOS ANGELES, June 25 (Xinhua) -- Archaeologists have found carbonised germinated grains showing that malt was produced for beer brewing as early as the Iron Age in the Nordic region.

According to a study published in the current issue of Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, the findings made in southern Sweden indicate a large-scale production of beer, possibly for feasting and trade.

"We found carbonised malt in an area with low-temperature ovens located in a separate part of the settlement. The findings are from the 400-600s, making them one of the earliest evidence of beer brewing in Sweden," Mikael Larsson, a researcher at Lund University, said in a statement.

Previous works have shown that beer was produced in Mesopotamia as early as 4,000 B.C. However, knowledge of earlier beer production is dependent on botanical evidence.

Archaeologists often find cereal grains on archaeological sites, but very rarely from contexts that testify as to how they were processed.

"Because the investigated oven and carbonised grain was situated in an area on the site with several similar ovens, but absent of remains to indicate a living quarter, it is likely that large-scale production of malt was allocated to a specific area on the settlement, intended for feasting and/or trading," said Larsson, who specialises in archaeobotany, the archaeology of human-plant interactions.