Region & History

Anyone wanting to know how old brewing regulations are in Germany needs to travel to Weißensee. In this town on the edge of the Thuringian Basin, once the seat of the Thuringian landgraves, historian Michael Kirchschlager discovered the Statuta thaberna of 1434 in the archives of Runneburg Castle in 1998. It states that only hops, malt and water may be used for brewing beer.

That makes it 82 years older than the Bavarian Reinheitsgebot of 1516. It was never a law for all of Germany, only for a single town. Even in the south there were older rules—Landshut in 1409, Regensburg in 1447—so it's more accurate to call Weißensee an early voice rather than the first.

But the most famous name in the region is a town on the Weiße Elster in eastern Thuringia. Bad Köstritz and its Köstritzer Erbschenke were first documented in 1543, and the brewery still cites that year today. In 1696 the Counts of Reuß took over the operation, and from 1806 it was allowed to call itself a princely brewery, since the family had been elevated to princely rank.

Goethe and Wilhelm von Humboldt are said to have drunk beer from Köstritz. The best evidence for this comes from the brewery's own tradition, rather than any surviving receipt. What is certain is that the name Köstritzer is now synonymous with Schwarzbier almost everywhere in Germany.

After reunification, the brewery joined the Bitburger Braugruppe in April 1991, and it remains a subsidiary to this day. Neither Köstritzer nor Schwarzbier carries EU protected-origin status, since Schwarzbier is a style name rather than a place name. Exactly how many breweries Thuringia has today depends on how you count.