WHISKY OR WHISKEY?

A RELOOK AT THE PEG OF SCOTCH

Aqua vitae (‘water of life’ in Latin) was the generic term for distilled spirits throughout the Roman Empire, widely used during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and translated into many languages. In Gaelic, it was uisge beatha, in Irish uisce beatha. Whisky connoisseur Charles MacLean says that this was Anglicised from uiskie (c.1618) to whiskie (1715) to whisky (1746). F Paul Pacult, the author of ‘A Double Scotch’, 2005, says that Aqua Vitae ultimately became whisky in 1736.

THE WHISKY VERSUS WHISKEY DEBATE

In a quick research, I first found the spelling Whiskey in the third description of the Malt Tax Act of 1725 as printed in 1785. Subsequently, I found both spellings used equally widely, even in the British Parliament. Such variations were not uncommon, given the number of bodies passing local Acts and signing them on the basis of the Malt Tax Act, whether in London, Edinburgh, Glasgow or Dublin. In fact, the Hansard of 1896 uses just the one term 'Whiskey'. Whisky or whiskey is by convention, not law: the Royal Commission on Whiskey and Other Potable Spirits (1908/09) spelt both Irish and Scotch with an ‘e’ throughout.

Interestingly, it was the Irish Association headed by the 'Big Four' (John Jameson & Son, John Power & Son, George Roe & Co. and Willam Jameson & Co.) who argued before the Commission that their triple-distilled pot spirit was infinitely better than that distilled in Scotland which contained inferior and virtually tasteless Patent Still distilled grain spirit and that the correct spelling was 'Whisky', to differentiate it from the plebeian Scottish and English 'Whiskey'.Rather ironic, one would say, looking back today at facts as they lay.

Gavin Smith writes in his A-Z of Whisky: "The first use of Scotch with the sense of specifically relating to whisky occurs in 1855, 'while malt liquors give our Scotch and Irish whiskies”…

I have already written that at least 92 nations/nation-states around the globe are trying their hand at making and selling whisky. Of these countries, all but four spell Aqua Vitae ‘Whisky’. The term ‘Whiskey’ is used in Ireland (since 1960), Mexico and Peru and for most, but not all, American brands.

Albania, Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Aruba, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Botswana, Brazil, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chile, China, Corsica, Croatia, Cuba, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Holland, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Israel, Ivory Coast, Japan, Kosovo, Latvia, Liberia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mongolia, Montenegro, Mozambique, Nepal, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Congo, Romania, Russia, Scotland, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Tanzania, Tasmania, The Philippines, Uruguay, Vietnam, Wales, Zimbabwe, Zambia & possibly a couple more spell it Whisky. 

The Americans keep their idiosyncratic asininity intact. George Dickel, Makers Mark, Old Forester and Rittenhouse Rye all use the “whisky” spelling for different reasons. Makers Mark uses the Scottish spelling of whisky as a nod to the Scottish heritage of their creator, T. William Samuels Sr. Similarly, George Dickel used this spelling because he believed his whisky was smooth and mellow like Scotch. Old Forester was produced before the “whiskey” spelling became mainstream in the US. Rittenhouse rye was originally produced by the Continental Distilling Corporation in Philadelphia, where they chose to drop the “e” for their rye ,but they kept the “e” for their bourbon. When Heaven Hill purchased the rights to Rittenhouse in the 1980s they kept that spelling.The US Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau always uses the 'whisky' sans the 'e'.

North Korea's Samilpo has two blends, Black Label @ 40% ABV and Red Label @ 42% ABV in 620 ml bottles that resemble the Johnnie Walker bottles, except for that odd volume. Their third brand at 45% ABV is expected soon. Other than the numbers in volume and ABV, nothing is in English; I suppose whisky would be right since Kim loves Trump! Or would it be the concerned writer’s choice?

87 or 88/92 should be above par for concluding that the global spelling of this type of alcoholic beverage is whisky. Except for morons! Yes, the Yanks are up to it again, forcing one into American spellings in the software in use and putting out, by default, their spellings. OK, grant them their peccadilloes, but can't we have a simple tab on the keyboard to choose Type of English? The iPhone appears to be the main culprit.

THE DOMINANCE OF IRISH WHISKY

Irish whisky, triple distilled in pot stills, was once the most popular spirit in the world, reaching its zenith in the three decades between 1880-1910. Ireland boasted over 30 legal distilleries in the 1890s that each produced, litre for litre, more than comparable Scottish distilleries. At their peak, the distilleries in Dublin were the largest in the world, with a combined output of almost 10 million gallons per year. The major distilleries belonged to the Big Four, John Jameson & Son, John Power & Son, George Roe & Co., and William Jameson & Co, all from Dublin. The output of George Roe’s distilleries was more than all of Speyside and the Lowlands combined, and they dominated the markets not tightly controlled by the British Crown.

Jameson’s Midleton Distillery first opened with a whopping 31,618-gallon pot still (143,862 litres), which remains in situ within the historic distillery, and can be viewed as part of the tour at the Jameson Experience Midleton. The new stills at Midleton are currently the largest operational pot stills in the world. In a bid to hurt them in the early 1900s, Scottish distillers started to sell poor quality whiskies under Irish labels with impunity. They did set the Irish back, adding to the decline in production caused by poor harvests in Ireland for an extended period. The Scotch Whisky market, itself reeling from the Pattison Crash, was soon to recover due the Phylloxera Epidemic in France, which shut their wine and Cognac production down for over 30 years.

THE BRITISH IN INDIA

Changing tack entirely, The East India Company (EIC), having first landed on Indian soil in 1608, stated that they were only a trading company. Accepted without demur, they showed their true intent as they slowly but surely realised that India was a divided country, involved in internecine squabbles. The Islamic Mughals ran their empire from Delhi, fought off invaders from Persia, and were involved in far too many petty skirmishes. Exploiting this divide, the Brits turned into rapacious plunderers, looting Indian states with gay abandon. Shashi Tharoor, a polemicist of renown, avers in the annual Oxford Debate (2015) that the British Raj became what it was till WWII off 43 trillion GBP looted from India over 200 years.

In 1765, the EIC had an irregular army of 20,000 with a few Civil Servants strung out over the country and company-appointed British Army Officers under the command of one Major-General Stringer Lawrence. This would imply that there would have been at least three Brigadier Generals, six Cols, twelve majors and 48 Capt/Lts then.

The British Parliament now needed to shelter their troops as they fought in the French War, and 10 years later, against the Americans. So, the Crown did what they liked to do and made a decision that benefited British troops. They enacted the Quartering Acts of 1765, which stated that inns, stables, taverns, and wineries were required to house troops at the discretion of a British officer. Troops were allowed to take as they pleased, which would run taverns and wineries dry. This facility was accorded to the East India Company’s British officers and troops as well.

The cost of quartering troops would often fall on the shoulders of local landowners and Rajas. Eventually, their expenses were reimbursed by colonial kingdoms — not the British government. Soon, British troops started taking refuge in private homes. Without fear of penalty, they could barge into your house, kick you out of your bed, take your food, and tell you that you'd (maybe) be paid back in a few months.

As their reach expanded over India from Peshawar in the north to Sind in the west (in Pakistan now) and Rangoon (Yangon) in the east to the recaptured Madras in the South along the eastern coastline, so did their Armies, reaching 200,000 by 1790 and 260,000 by 1803. They dominated the Muslims who constituted the majority of the populace north of a line joining Pune (Poona) on the western coast and Bhubaneswar on the eastern coast (part of the Bengal Presidency). They also controlled Punjab. By now, they had established over 45 Residencies, one in every princely state they took over, under Residents, a Civil Service officer who was boss of all he could see, helped by around 6,000 sepoys under British Officers. The officers were housed in Cantonments and the sepoys in adjuncts to the official Cantonment. As a composite army, it was complete, with Artillery, Cavalry, Infantry, Sappers/ Miners and Staff Corps in a Commissariat. The British had arrived, bringing their customs along. Their Officers’ Messes became the focal point for whist, croquet, dinner dances and dining-in nights with their G&Ts, Claret, Port and Madeira. Perhaps a cigar as well!

After the Treaty of Salbai was concluded in 1782 between the British and Maharaja Mahadji Scindia of Gwalior, David Anderson, who contributed to drafting the treaty, was appointed resident at the Gwalior court. The fortress of Gwalior was captured by the Indians in the Great War of 1857, and recaptured by the Brits in 1858. The Resident had his own railway station, now used by the Army as their Institute (Club).

The Resident decided to take over the Maharaja of Scindia’s zenankhana, a magnificent palace near Morar, set up in ten acres of lush greenery with all luxuries available to the inmates of the harem, eunuch quarters included and located in the midst of its official estate of 750 acres with three villages included. The Residency was returned to the rightful owner after Indian Independence in 1947 and the Maharaja installed his Army Commander, General Rane there. In 1950, the Scindia rulers acceded to the new Union of India, and Gwalior state was absorbed into the new Indian state of Madhya Bharat, later Madhya Pradesh. The Residency was taken over by the Indian Govt. in 1951 and a school established there, with the three villages regaining their individual status. A decade later, the school and its ten acres of land was handed over to the Indian Air Force.

Immediately after the pompous Resident forcibly reoccupied the palace, life returned to the British ways of the world. The word burra means big/large and chota means small. Both are obviously relative. The Sahib would dress for dinner and at 1830 hrs, order his first drink, a burra peg of whisky (Blended Malt) and a siphon of soda. A little white or red wine with dinner and a chota peg of French brandy/cognac thereafter. The Brits were not known to be moderate drinkers, happy with just the one burra peg.

The term burra/chota peg could not have come before 1765; in all probability, it would have been introduced circa 1780. The British Crown assumed direct control of the Indian subcontinent in the form of the new British Raj in 1858 when the East India Company mishandled the Indian uprising of 1857. It assumed the Company's governmental functions and absorbed its navy and its armies. Blended Scotch would have arrived in 1860-61, initially in limited quantities, the volume increasing with time and expansion of the Industry post-1863.

The standard term ‘peg’ is a vestige of British colonialism and was/is used extensively in the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent and eastern Asia, i.e., wherever there were Indians to be found.

Starting in 1780, the only term used to define volume in the Indian Defence, Paramilitary and Police Forces was/is a peg. This is because the British overlords had decreed that every soldier/sailor would be issued four pegs of Rum every evening, requiring them to define the volume of a peg. 

When dealers in potable spirits changed over to glass bottles circa 1780-1810, the largest bottle suitable for enclosing spirits was a function of the type of furnace, the material used and the glassblower's lung capacity and dexterity. Most bottles came out in the 26.5-27.0 fluid-ounce capacity. The invention of the automatic glass bottle-blowing machine in 1880 industrialised the process of making bottles and sizing on demand.

One 26½ oz (750 ml) bottle was taken to hold 26 pegs, mathematically working out to 28.8 ml/peg. The 26½ oz bottle was thirteen (13) fingers tall, with a few ml (1/2 oz) left over at the very top of the neck. This extra 1/2 oz was then considered a provision made for evaporation in the Raj’s hot weather and spillage; the hourglass-shaped ‘peg measure’ poured out just that bit less. The standard measure then became 28.4 ml, one Imperial ounce. The field ration was thus two fingers in height, from the top of the forefinger to the underside of the middle finger when held horizontally across a bottle (four pegs).

THE PATIALA PEG

In the Punjab of yore, the hefty Sardars (Sikhs) refused to accept the then piffling ration. The Maharaja of Patiala, with one eye on the British, solved this problem by a covert redefinition of the peg. He ruled that all Sikhs would be given two “Patiala pegs.” A Patiala peg is the amount of liquor poured into a standard glass and equal to the height between the top of the index finger and the bottom of the little finger of the stoutest Sardar around when held parallel to one another across the sides of the bottle. The middle and ring fingers would be folded inwards, so the basic tenet of two-finger rationing was observed, if only in spirit.

Today, a peg that represented 28.4 ml, one Imperial ounce, or 29.57 ml (one US oz) has been increased to 30 ml for convenience in bars on civvy street.