Cologne Mandates Top-Fermented Brewing

In 1603, Cologne’s city council ordered that only top-fermented beer could be brewed within the city. The measure prohibited the production of bottom-fermented beer, which was spreading northward from southern Germany and competing with Cologne’s established brewing tradition. The ordinance did not create Kölsch, a pale beer style that emerged centuries later. It nevertheless helped preserve Cologne’s distinctive top-fermented brewing culture while bottom fermentation became increasingly important elsewhere in Germany. This continuity formed part of the historical foundation from which modern Kölsch eventually developed.