Welcome to Zoigl.de!

The Name
Zoigl is a beer which is only brewed in the region Upper Palatinate in Eastern Bavaria, between Franconia and the Czech Republik. For centuries, Zoigl is beeing brewed in brewhouses owned by the town or an assication of homebrewers. The wort is then brought to the private cellars of the brewers, where the fermentation with bottom fermenting yeast and the lagering of the beer is done.

A couple of weeks later the beer is tapped directly from the lagering tank and sold in the private rooms of the brewer, which are used as a pub only for a limited time until the beer is gone.

Then the Zoigl-Star, a sign to show that beer is sold in that house, is given to the next homebrewer. He then attaches the sign at the corner of his house.

In 1508 the word "zeigl" occurs the first time in a document at Neustadt an der Waldnaab. It comes from the German name for sign, "Zeichen", and was pronounced "zeigel" in the Upper Palatinate dialect. Today, the word "Zoigl" is still in use.

Finally, the beer-Style was named Zoigl!

The Zoigl-Star, a six-angular star similar to the Star of David, was the sign of brewers in the middle ages symbolizing the three elements water, earth and fire used for brewing and the three ingredients water, malt and hops. The importance of the yeast was not known at that time.

A drawing in an old book dating back to 1403 shows a brewing monk and the star:
Maybe the Zoigl-Star was already in use at that time. Old documents proove that Communal Brewhouses existed in more than ten towns before 1400.

Only 12 years after this picture was drawn, Neuhaus was given the right to build a communal brewhouse in the year 1415.