Yeah, you must have suffered when that ended.
The water was also rich in sulfates, which acted as a preservative, allowing the beer to be shipped to distant locations, even India - the Burton beers were called India pale ales, or I.P.A. for short. "The I.P.A. style came about because of the geology on which Burton was sited," Dr. Maltman said.
It surprised me to see such an error from an otherwise interesting, if unproven article. It makes me suspect a great deal of his conclusions, as I thought that this was pretty common knowledge among beer snobs.
I.P.A indeed get's it's name from the Empire shipping beers that far. But it gets it's bitterness from the hops, which is also a natural preservative. They LOADED the ales with hops to make the long ship's journeys - which is why a true I.P.A. is usually considerably more bitter than any other ale.
I now return myself to MY regularly scheduled ale - today it's an Old Fezziwig's, in honor of the season.