W. B. Henning:

Sogdiane was a wine-land even in Achaemenian times. Chorienes, at his surrender, could give a sufficiency of wine to every man in Alexander's army and still had ten times as much in his cellars, and that after a siege (Arrian, Iv, 21, 10). From Sogdian lands 15 viniculture spread across Central Asia to China.16 Sogdiane came to be the first centre of classical Persian poetry, which is drenched in wine ; Persian mul 'wine', an emotion-laden word of the devotee's, coexisting with the etymologically identical but more sober may, was a loan from Sogdian.17 Beer, on the other hand, was lowly regarded. Asadi says it causes belching.18 According to Rhazes, beer made of barley damaged the nerves, produced headaches, etc. Muwaffaq went further and claimed that beer, apart from causing borborygmus, sickness, and the like, was responsible for nothing less than leprosy.19 If in an old wine-land, as Sogdiane was, a rich man, at the acme of life and power, had given his guests a ' beer-feast' on the occasion of his children's marriage (as in the 'Job story'), would they have cheered him and praised his name ? He would have deserved the dismal fate that lay before him.

A borissza szogdok megvetették a sört, sőt áltudományos magyarázatokat gyártottak arról, hogy milyen betegségeket okoz a sörivás. :)