Archaeologists discover a 5000-year-old industrial-scale brewery in Egypt Shane McGlaun - Feb 17, 2021, 8:06am CST A team of archaeologists led by Deborah Vischak, an assistant professor of art and archaeology at Princeton, has made a discovery in Egypt that will excite beer fans. The researchers, who are part of the North Abydos Project, have uncovered evidence of the world’s oldest known industrial-scale beer production facility. The complex they have discovered is more than 5000 years old. The ancient brewery was able to produce enough beer to serve thousands of people in a single batch. The Princeton archaeological team worked with Egyptian archaeologists to date the brewery to the dawn of ancient Egyptian history, about 3000 BCE. That date corresponds with the approximate time of Upper and Lower Egypt’s political unification and the emergence of the pharaonic state.