Glossary
Reinheitsgebot
The Bavarian regulation of 1516 restricting beer ingredients to barley, hops and water, and the name now attached to a series of successor German brewing rules.
Pronounced RINE-heights-ge-bote.
Also called german beer purity law, purity law, beer purity law.
Historical. A former meaning. Present-day usage differs.
The 1516 Bavarian ordinance was principally an economic and public-order measure rather than a consumer-protection one: it reserved wheat and rye for bread, fixed beer prices, and restricted brewing to specified inputs. Yeast is absent from the list because its role was not yet understood.
It was Bavarian, not German — Germany did not exist in 1516 — and it was extended across the new empire only in the late nineteenth century, as a condition Bavaria attached to its participation. The 1993 Provisional German Beer Law that now governs the matter permits more than the 1516 text did, and a 1987 European Court of Justice ruling established that it could not be used to exclude imported beer.
The term "Reinheitsgebot" itself does not appear until the twentieth century. It is a considerably better marketing phrase than a description of a continuous 500-year legal tradition.
Commonly misunderstood
Widely described as an unbroken 500-year German purity law protecting beer quality. It was Bavarian, economic in purpose, repeatedly rewritten, and named long after the fact.
Related
- Adjunct — What it restricted.
- Krausening — The compliant way to carbonate under it.
More vocabulary
Abbey beer · Alcohol-free · Beer duty · Gluten-free beer · Low-alcohol · Trappist beer
See every term on the glossary index.
Last reviewed 2026-08-16.
Evidence
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The 1516 ordinance was Bavarian rather than German, restricted beer to barley, hops and water, and served economic and public-order purposes — reserving wheat and rye for bread and fixing prices — as much as any concern with quality.
Backed by a source
Sources: The Oxford Companion to Beer — print; Vorläufiges Biergesetz (German Provisional Beer Law)
A 1987 European Court of Justice ruling established that Germany could not use the purity requirements to exclude beer lawfully produced in other member states, and that its blanket ban on additives in imported beer was disproportionate.
Checked against the source Applies in Germany and European Union. In force from 1987-03-12. Last checked 2026-08-16.
Source: Case 178/84, Commission v Germany (the "beer purity" judgment), Judgment of 12 March 1987, operative part (Judgment of 12 March 1987)
German brewing is now governed by the Vorläufiges Biergesetz rather than the 1516 text, and that law permits more than the original ordinance did — including, for top-fermented beer, other malted grains and sugars.
Backed by a source Applies in Germany. Last checked 2026-08-16.
Source: Vorläufiges Biergesetz (German Provisional Beer Law)
Yeast is absent from the 1516 list of permitted ingredients because its role in fermentation was not yet understood, not because it was prohibited.
Backed by a source
Source: The Oxford Companion to Beer — print