Distilled Liquors
. Distilled Liquors, any of various beverages of high alcohol content, produced by distillation, formerly called ardent spirits or aqua vitae. They may be made from other beverages of lower alcohol content, such as brandy from wine or applejack from hard cider, or from fermented mixtures originally containing large proportions of carbohydrates, such as rum from molasses or whiskey from grain mash. The earliest alcoholic beverages were products of simple fermentation that, at most, yielded about 12 percent alcohol. The first recorded mention of distillation was made by Abul Kasim, a 10th-century Arabian physician. At first only wine was distilled, but soon afterward other fermented products were employed. The process of distillation not only concentrates the alcohol, but also removes from the beverage a large portion of the unpleasant-tasting impurities. If rectification (purification by repeated or by fractional distillation) is carried too far, however, all the flavoring elements are