Michele Scienza, according to Wine Advocate, one of the most creative producers of Bolgheri

The American magazine Wine Advocate has published Monica Lerner's opinion on the latest vintages of  DOC Bolgheri wines. You can find the article at the link below but, since it is readable only for subscribers, here is a quick guide.

Thanks so much to Monica Lernet and her staff!

Link

We are very happy that we are defined as the most creative producers of Bolgheri. The adjectives he uses most for us (and our wines) are: "crazy", "unusual", "different from its peers", etc. It really seems strange to us to pass for "bizarre" because we are among the few winemakers that yet produce wines according to ancient Italian wine traditions. Any way, everyone has their own point of view! Absolutely, we pride ourselves on making wines that are recognized as non-trivial (or obvious).

bda6709096e442d0b4b2882bbbf495d3_5-italy-tuscany-bolgheri-redwine-vermentino-whitewineSo, she write: "I fondly remember my visit to this estate, albeit many years ago, and have a vivid memory of the crazy Guado al Melo vineyards. Exploring the experimental plots is like being an archeologist of the vine, with so many new and unknown treasures to discover. Michele Scienza and his dad Attilio have a collection of grapevines found nowhere else, all culled from years of overseas exploration and travel. They were brought back from the Republic of Georgia and other ancient locations for Vitis vinifera".

Here, there are her reviews of our wines .

We had to choose between our white wines to be tasted and we decided for L'Airone Vermentino. She certainly appreciated it a lot, as it got an amazing score for its category and price (89).

Airone

 

Great appreciation also for the Rute 2018.

I looked for what these Graham crackers are, we don't know them in Italy. I have found that they are very crumbly cookies made with a particular blend of whole flours. Here I also found a recipe, if you want to try it.

Rute

 

She raises the level (and the score, 91) with the Atis 2017.

Atis

 

Her favorite was certainly the Jassarte (91+): "You cant' beat this level of creativity".

Jassarte

 

 

In the general part of the article on DOC Bolgheri, the 2017 vintage is presented. It was certainly not easy but, beyond having led to a significant reduction in production, it was not even so negative in our opinion. The comparison with the Sahara is too hard. Conversely, Bolgheri is a territory that always demonstrates an excellent capacity for resilience. In our opinion, Bolgheri has endured the dryness of the vintage very well, confirming its extraordinary wine-growing vocation.

 


The harsh and wild Maremma of Bolgheri and Castagneto

Nowadays, our territory is a Mediterranean garden of great beauty, where prestigious wines are produced. In ancient times, come I told here and here, it was a flourishing agricultural area, at the center of an excellent communication and trade system. Wine, olive oil and cereals were produced and traded in the various Roman farms of the area, located as today in the foothills and in the plain around the Via Aurelia.

Instead, in the long intermediate period between these two extremes, the southern Tuscan coast underwent a dramatic transformation: it became a poor and isolated territory, dominated by marshes, with little more than subsistence agriculture. It will remain the same for centuries. How was this possible?

The nature of the place certainly played an important role. The natural coastal marshes have spread without the human intervention of constant management and care of the territory, started with the Etruscans and perfected in Roman times.

The geographical question is certainly decisive but it is not sufficient to explain this involution, which had depended above all on political and social reasons, in any case. The Maremma, perhaps too far from the centers of power of the time, became only a land to be plundered, without the rulers caring about its development in the least. This management and local poverty made the social situation very stagnant, with a feudal approach that prevented for centuries the birth of a dynamic class of landowners, able to lead a development of agriculture (including viticulture), as it happened in other parts of Tuscany.

For centuries, therefore, the Maremma was not the sunny place of holidays it is today. The name Maremma was the synonym of poor and wild land. This condition remained more or less until the 19th century, for some areas even for the first half of the 20th century.

It is the Maremma that Dante cites in the Divine Comedy as a comparison for the sad wood of suicides, an intricate and malevolent forest, full of brushwood and fearsome beasts. It defines it with those it considers its borders: Cecina to the north and Corneto to the south (the medieval name of the actual Tarquinia):

“[…] non han sì aspri sterpi né sì folti

quelle fiere selvagge che ‘n odio hanno

 tra Cecina e Corneto i luoghi cólti.”.

 

It is the Maremma that, still in the nineteenth century, made the life of its inhabitants and seasonal workers precarious, due to the malaria, as recalled in this famous Tuscan folk song:

"Everybody tells me about Maremma, Maremma...

But it seems to me that Maremma is bitter
If a bird goes there, it's bound to lose its feathers
I lost a loved one there
May Maremma, Maremma be damned
And the one who loves it may be damned as well
My heart cries whenever you go there
And I am afraid you will never make it back,
...".

Maremma amara ("Bitter Maremma") Tuscan folk song

Our municipality of Castagneto Carducci is in the northernmost part of the Maremma, called Alta Maremma (High Maremma) or (in the past) also Maremma of Pisa.

 

The wine producing

Throughout Italy, wine production in the Early Middle Ages was significantly downsized compared to the flourishing Roman era, but it never completely disappeared. The story was very different in central-northern Europe, where viticulture had been brought by the Romans. It almost completely disappeared where winegrowing was made difficult and expensive by an unfavorable climate. It survived only thanks to the monastic orders and the Church. The religious production was then joined by a noble one, of nobles and princes, for whom wine was a symbol of prestige and power.

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Instead, the peasant production always remained in the Mediterranean area, such as Italy, where the vine grows luxuriantly without too much effort. It had already returned to good quantitative levels by the end of the Upper Middle Ages, with the resumption of trade. Almost all the Italian Municipal Statutes of the time were concerned with regulating the production of wine, duties and so on.

However, the refined Roman techniques were lost everywhere and there was a more primitive production. It will take centuries to recover much of this knowledge. A truly substantial transformation will be thanks to the discoveries and innovations of the second half of the nineteenth century.

Medieval viticulture was generally characterized by closed and protected vineyards, realized close to the villages and also within the walls of villages and cities. The spaces to be exploited were limited and therefore the cultivation of low vine training systems prevailed. From the Renaissance, with the return to open fields, the vine trained ("married") to the tree will return to prevail in central Italy. As already told here in Roman times, one and the other form (with all the local variations) will never completely disappear in Italy. One or the other will prevail according to historical eras and local traditions.

 

Even in our territory, the vine and wine did not disappear even in the darkest times. The presence of the vineyards around Castagneto is mentioned since the first written document of the Early Middle Ages (754 AD) and in subsequent ones, with a certain increase in the seventeenth-century and, above all, the eighteenth-century noble properties.

I have grouped this long period because unfortunately we have no info on what viticulture and local wines of these times were like. We only know that it was a production essentially dedicated to local consumption, without further development due to the general difficulties of the territory at the time. There will only be a productive leap in the nineteenth century, but I will talk about this in a future post.

A peculiarity is that the Maremma peasants, alongside the production in the vineyards, still continued to use the wild grapes of the "Lambruscaie" for centuries, the aggregations of wild vines in our woods from which viticulture had originated thousands of years earlier (see here). As described by Emilio Sereni, there has almost never been a clear separation between the agricultural-pastoral environment and the natural one in Italy. I like to think that this tradition is not dead and is returning to the idea of agro-ecology that we are trying to apply to our day.

 

Let's now see how the landscape and agriculture of our territory have been transformed over these long centuries, when the Maremma was still poor and wild.

 

 

Maremma of the hilly villages.

Between the final part of the Roman Empire and the beginning of the Early Middle Ages, there was a political vacuum, accompanied by barbarian raids and wars, that dramatically transformed our territory, like all of Italy. Between the sixth and eighth centuries, the area was almost depopulated and the settlements increasingly moved to the hills. They tried to escape the progressive advance of the coastal marshes but also to move away from the Via Aurelia, that was up to then the central axis of the territory but which by now had become the gateway to barbarians and armies.

People came back to live the pre-Roman places, where it was easier to protect oneself and hide, with nearby sources and woods for sustenance, as agriculture was no longer sufficient.

Bolgheri
Bolgheri

In fact, within a few generations, many of the knowledge and techniques were been lost in every field. Villages returned to being made up of huts. In some areas of Tuscany, people had even came back to live in the caverns. The use of stone will only be recovered towards the 9th-11th century, first for the defensive walls, the stately homes and then the rest.

In this period, the structure of the Maremma landscape was born, whose imprint is still visible today:

  1. The part of the coastal plain was dominated by marshes, reeds and scrubland.
  2. The foothill and first hill area was inhabited and cultivated. Here the settlements were formed. Later they became medieval villages and castles. The crops were placed around the villages. Closer to the houses (and later also within the walls) there were vineyards, vegetable gardens, olive trees and other fruit trees, well protected from wild and non-wild animals, as well as humans. Cereals and other crops (such as textile fibers) were grown in larger spaces, a little further away from the villages. The individual plots were called mansi. they were on the different sides of the hills, to take advantage of the different exposures to the sun.
  3. The highest hills were instead dominated by woods, the true central axis for the life and economy of the time.

[one_third][info_box title="" image="" animate=""]The Lombard dominion began in the 6th century; the local power center of the duchy was in Lucca. In 730 A.D. around, a more local lord was appointed, the count Ratcauso, sent to the territory especially with the task of defending mineral resources from pirate attacks. Castagneto is mentioned for the first time in a document dated 754 AD, in the list of assets given to the nascent Monteverdi Abbey, founded by Ratcauso's son, Walfredo. Bolgheri is mentioned for the first time in a papal bull of 1075, with the name of "Sala del Duca Allone" (Duke Allone's House), when the Franks had already taken over the Lombards. The presence of the castle is reported in 1158. Other castles were built on the intermediate hills: Castiglioncello (Little Castle) of Bolgheri and that of Segalari.

The actual few remains of the Donoratico Tower (not the current Donoratico village, which was born at the end of the 19th century) mark a site of very long residential stratification. Do you remember that I already talked about it in the Etruscan era and then in the Roman one (here)? Archaeologists have also found the remains of huts from the early Lombard period (called grubenhaus), from around the middle of the 8th century. Later the village of huts became a small fortified village and then a castle. This place was finally abandoned in the 16th century, perhaps following a siege or a plague (or both). This definitive abandonment, after millennia of housing continuity, remains a mystery to scholars.[/info_box][/one_third]

The new hillside settlements almost never included religious buildings. The churches mostly remained where they were in the Late Empire, on the plain, near the main Roman roads. This is another typical feature of the Tuscan countryside landscape: hilly villages and lowland churches, where inhabitants of different settlements met. Only later, after the IX-X century, the churches will enter the villages, built by the new lords as a sign of prestige.

 

Maremma of the woods

At this time, the forest recovered a large part of the territory throughout Europe; this phenomenon lasted at least until the tenth century. The forest became the center of the economy, due to a now secondary agriculture. In our area, where agriculture never developed much at least until the nineteenth century, the forest remained central for a long time. Even today it dominates a large part of our hills and the culture of the territory.

Wood was collected for all uses, first only for subsistence. Then it became an important economic resource, whose monopoly was in the hands of governments and their feudal lords. Timber and other products were transported by sea from localities that were natural ports along the coast, often located at the outlets of streams: Renaione, Seggio, Bassa, Paradù. Today they are beautiful beach places.

Wood was collected for all uses, first only for subsistence. Then it became an important economic resource, whose monopoly was in the hands of governments and their feudal lords. Timber and other products were transported by sea from localities that were natural ports along the coast, often located at the outlets of streams: Renaione, Seggio, Bassa, Paradù. Today they are beautiful beach places. In the woods they hunted and gathered spontaneous fruits. Here there were many chestnut groves (it is not a coincidence that the capital of our municipality is called Castagneto, that means "chestnut grove" in Italian), much more than today. The oaks gave acorns, used for animals but also for humans. The manna was obtained from the manna ash tree, a sweetener extracted for centuries in Maremma. This production will end at the beginning of the nineteenth century, when the consumption of imported cane sugar became common. Then, there were various fruits: blackberries, strawberry trees fruit, mushrooms, etc. The forest was for centuries the reign of the charcoal burners, both for domestic production and for the supply of iron smelting furnaces, one of the main economic resources of our lands since ever.

Livestock were mostly raised in the wild in the woods and uncultivated pastures. Pigs were predominant, left in the woods almost all year round and only put in the shed in winter. For a long time, they were the main source of fat, replacing olive oil, whose cultivation was in decline after the Roman era. The semi-swampy woods of the coastal area were instead suitable for the wild breeding of buffaloes, managed by herders and the typical Maremma herders on a horse, called "butteri" ("buttero" in the singular form). The presence of the wild buffalo is very ancient, evidenced at least in Roman times. Yet, the French naturalist Buffon wrote, in the 18th century, that the buffalo was introduced into Italy by the Lombards and this theory is reported in various texts. The buffaloes wandered around our plain until the early decades of the nineteenth century, when people switched to breeding only in the stables. Today they have completely disappeared.

 

Giovanni Fattori "Conduttori-di-mandrie", 1907
Giovanni Fattori "Buttero", 1907
Maremma of peasants and nobles

The first aggregation of the villages, born in the period of power vacuum, originated equal peasant communities, where agriculture was often managed on a community basis or for families.

The transformation of the villages into fortified ones took place more or less between the 9th and 11th centuries, with the reaffirmation of a hierarchy of local power. According to scholars, some figures induced the weakest families to sell their properties in exchange for protection, accumulating wealth, prestige and decision-making positions over time. The centralization also included agricultural lands, with the birth of landed property, which became increasingly large, organized around the curtes (courts). The manorial farm was similar to the villa of the late Roman Empire (which I explained in the final part of this article). It was divided into small plots, "mansi", entrusted to the peasants. A part of the fields was managed directly by the lord, with the work of servants and the forced work of the farmers.

 

Sharecropping, which will have a central role in much of Tuscany starting from the year one thousand, spread here very late, not before the 18th-19th century. The farmers of the Maremma have almost never lived in the countryside, except in recent times, also due to the frequent pirate raids, as evidenced by the many watchtowers scattered along the coast. The peasants worked in the fields during the day and returned to the safety of the fortified walls of the village at night. This ancient use will long deprive them of the right to a farmhouse and livestock by the lord.

The rampant poverty and the very long feudal setting have polarized the local social classes for centuries, not allowing for a long time the birth of intermediate classes that, everywhere, have been promoters of the transformations and developments of the territories.

[one_third][info_box title="" image="" animate=""]At the end of the Lombard and Carolingian age, new protagonists assert themselves along our coast: the families of the counts (Aldobrandeschi, Ardengheschi, Gherardeschi, etc ...) and the bishops of the Maremma dioceses.

The Gherardesca counts begin their certain history in the mid-twelfth century, when the territory passed under the Republic of Pisa, and they maintained power even with the subsequent passage under the Florentine Republic (early fifteenth century). The three villages of our territory became autonomous municipalities in this period: Donoratico (not the current one, but the ancient one on the hill) (1407), Bolgheri (1409) and Castagneto (1421), in continuous conflict with the count. His residence was the castle of Castagneto and for this reason it became the capital of the Community.[/info_box][/one_third]

Since all the lands (or almost) belonged to the counts, the access to the goods of the territory by people was regulated by the "civic uses", use rights by the inhabitants for grazing, gathering in the woods, fishing, etc. Some were direct descendants of the Roman-era rights on the public property, others were novelties. For example, the poors picking ("ruspo") was allowed after the owner's harvest in the chestnut grove. There was the "ius pascendi", which allowed the livstock grazing on the land where the owner had already harvested. The "ius lignandi" made possible to collect some wood for family use in the woods of the lord or the municipality. The hunt was never possible, especially big game, which remained exclusive to the lords. The conflict over the use rights between local communities and noble families was the occasion of numerous disputes and clashes up to the mid-nineteenth century.

From the thirteenth century onwards,  poverty and very strong social inequalities led to the birth of brigandage in Maremma. The Florentine deputy Oreste Massari, in the nineteenth century, defined it as "the savage and brutal protest of misery against ancient and centuries-old injustices." The end of the Maremma brigandage was marked by the killing of the last greatest brigand, Domenico Tiburzi, in 1896.

 

Maremma of transhumance.
scenic-view-of-summer-landscape-royalty-free-image-731849353-1563800225
The hills between Bolgheri and Castagneto (ph.: Marco Bicci)

However, the period of relative peace of the early Middle Ages led to an increase in the population throughout Italy and a contraction of the woods in favor of agriculture. In Maremma, however, this good moment did not last long and did not have many positive effects. For example, nothing was done to reclaim the marshy areas which, on the contrary, expanded even more after the political decline following the defeat of Pisa in the 13th century.

The beginning of the Little Glaciation, at the beginning of 1300, brought famines and epidemics, such as that of the Black Plague. Tuscany was hit hard. The population decreased by 80% In Maremma. The most striking case was Grosseto, which increased from 1200 to 100 inhabitants. In Castagneto the population was practically halved

The uncultivated places and the woods have always been used for pastoralism and transhumance but from the Late Middle Ages, with the lowering of the population, this became a real business for governments and their feudal lords. The rent of the pastures expanded, influencing in a decisive way the lack of agricultural development of the Maremma.

The flocks arrived in the north Maremma from internal areas of Tuscany (Casentino, Mugello, Lucca), even from Bologna and Perugia, attracted by the local mild climate, from late autumn to early spring. A tax was paid for each animal, regulated by the "Customs of pastures".

This economy was increased even more from the sixteenth century onwards. The landscape was more and more modified by the increase in transhumant flocks and by the use of fire for their enlargement. The great spread of the Mediterranean scrub, that still exists today on the hills, is a sign of a very unnatural environment, the result of constant human action.

[highlight background="#B2BA97" color="white"]The Mediterranean scrub is an intermediate phase of the evolution of spontaneous vegetation in our environment. The cycle steps are as follows, if no external disturbances occur. After a fire, herbaceous plants are reborn and the prairie is formed. After that, small shrubs develop (such as phyllirea, thyme, cistus, rosemary, etc.). In land where these shrubs are interspersed with numerous rocks and the cycle will not go on, there is the garrigue ("gariga"). When shrubs become predominant, we have the low scrub ("macchia bassa"). Then, higher shrubs can take over (strawberry tree, myrtle, spiny broom, mastic tree, etc.), which form the tall scrub ("macchia alta"), the one that is commonly identified more with the name of Mediterranean scrub. Among these tall shrubs, some trees become more and more numerous (downy oak, holm oak, Aleppo pine, etc.). A mixed formation is born, in Italian "forteto" (I haven't find an English term). Then, the trees become more and more predominant and we arrive at the final evolution, the Mediterranean wood.[/highlight]

Maremma which, with difficulty, starts to become agricultural

[one_third][info_box title="" image="" animate=""]The Florentine Republic then became the Medici Grand Duchy (1569), but the situation did not change much in Maremma and the same feudal settings were maintained. In 1737, the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty took over the leadership of the re-named Grand Duchy of Tuscany. Towards the end of the century, a first era of reforms began. Some contributed a little to stirring the stagnant social situation and finally led to the birth of a new (small) class of agricultural owners. From 1799 to 1814, Tuscany was occupied by the French. This led to the abolition of the fiefdoms and the counts became real owners. After the return, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany  tried to stimulate the cultivation of uncultivated land, yet encouraging the large land ownership.[/info_box][/one_third]

donoratico-castagneto-carducci-livorno-tuscany-royalty-free-image-614421444-1563800317
Le vigne di oggi con sullo sfondo i resti della torre del castello di Donoratico (foto di Roberto Nencini)

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the counts, due to the low rents of the lands, were also pushed to make them pay more with rents or transfers, which gave way to an initial expansion of agriculture. It was a timid beginning: in fact, still in the mid-eighteenth century the plain was largely occupied by wooded and marshy areas, the hills with woods and pastures.

The counts of Bolgheri increased the rents to the peasants. So, the farmers began the first deforestations near the village, for agricultural purposes. There was a very unfavorable sort of sharecropping ("mezzadria"). So, they weren't called "mezzadri" but "mezzaioli": they had to divide the products in half with the owner but without the right to a farmhouse and livestock. Another type of contract, whose name has remained in the local toponyms, was the "terratico", in which the agreement was that for each sack of wheat the peasants had for sowing, the owner had two sacks of the product back. At the end of the 1600s, the count took back some of the rented land, to begin to take care of agriculture himself.

Instead, in the area around Castagneto, under a different branch of the Gherardesca family, there were another kind of agricultural contract, called "livello". It was a type of agrarian contract born in the Lombard period, similar to the Roman emphyteusis. It was a more advantageous rent for the farmer, often of a long duration, with which the lease-holder fully enjoyed the property in exchange for a money rent. There was an obligation to improve the propriety but also the possibility of redeeming the property or selling the rent contract. In fact, it paved the way for the born of a new class of landowners.

First "livello"-contracts date back to the seventeenth. In 1784, the Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo rented out as "livello" various ecclesiastical and community properties. In 1788, the count della Gherardesca gave various lands as "livello" to the Castagneto's inhabitants in exchange of the end of the use rights. The last contracts dates back to 1849, when the count ceded several lands to the municipality which he then, in turn, ceded to the citizens. For each "livello"-contract, there was a transformation of the landscape, with the growth of agricultural crops.

So, agriculture, up to then practically subsistence, finally began to grow. The classic Mediterraenan triad was mainly cultivated: wheat, vines and olive trees. At the end of the eighteenth century, the cultivation of corn also developed, brought by seasonal workers called "Lombard" (although they mainly came from the Tuscan-Emilian Apennines).

This timid agricultural increase, however, was not easy: even nature seemed against. For almost the entire eighteenth century, the region was periodically invaded by locusts, a disconcerting biblical catastrophe, never happened before and, so far, never repeated (fortunately). In Piombino, on 23 June 1711, around 6.00 pm, a dark mass appeared on the sea and a cloud of locusts quickly covered the whole countryside. The invasions of grasshoppers repeated themselves periodically until 1786, spreading up to Castagneto and Sassetta, south to Massa Marittima and Gavorrano, destroying numerous cultivated lands.

In the second half of the eighteenth century, the grand duke pushed for the construction of the first farmhouses ("casali") of our territory. [info_box title="" image="" animate=""]A great estate was divides in smaller parts, called "poderi" in Tuscany. Each "podere" was entrusted to a peasant family, who lived in the "casale" (farmhouse). [/info_box]Unfortunately, to limit costs, the remains of abandoned buildings were looted. Thus, all the still existing finds from ancient times disappeared, such as the last original stretches of the Via Aurelia and the remains of Roman villae (farms). Do you remember the tombstone I told you about here? It was found in the wall of a stable. In the mid-nineteenth century the remains of the Roman villa called "Of the Mosaic" disappeared in this way (see here). The same happened for the remains of medieval buildings such as the abbey of Saint Mary in Aschis, Saint Columban, parts of the Castle of Donoratico (at the time, the remains were much larger; today, there are only the ruins of a tower), etc.

Accused by the Grand Duke of keeping their lands badly, the counts also began to do the first works of reclamation of the marshy areas and improvement of the roads. So, at the end of the eighteenth century, construction began on what will become the famous cypress boulevard of Bolgheri.

 

Here we stop, on the threshold of the period of the greatest transformation of our territory. We will then see how the nineteenth century was the century of the first important expansion of viticulture in our area.

This is where the era of the harsh and wild Maremma formally ends for our territory.

The expansion of reclamations and the development of specialized crops in the nineteenth century definitively transformed this territory into agricultural. Therefore, it was not considered longer part of the Maremma, according to the definition of the time. The inhabitants were happy, because this membership was considered dishonorable at that times:

“despising the ancient and defamed name with a good reason” (Beccarini, 1873).

 

 

 

"Il paesaggio come risorsa", di Mauro Agnoletti, Edizioni ETS, 2009.

"Vini Bolgheri e altri vini di Castagneto", di Luciano Bezzini, Enrico Guagnini. Casa Editrice Le Lettere, 1996.

"Dominare e gestire un territorio: ascesa e sviluppo delle signorie forti nella Maremma toscana centrosettentrionale tra X e XII secolo", Giovanna Bianchi, Archeologia Medievale, XXXVII, 2010, pag. 93-103.

"Castello di Donoratico, i risultati delle prime campagne di scavo (2000-2002), a cura di Giovanna Bianchi, Ed. All'Insegna del Giglio, 2004

"Il discorso del vino", di Pietro Stara, ed. ZeroinCondotta, 2013

"L'insediamento altomedievale nelle campagne toscane", di Marco Valenti, Ed. All'Insegna del Giglio, 2004

"Storia del paesaggio agrario", di Emilio Sereni, Ed. Laterza, 1961

 


Welcome Antillo 2019! About traditional grape varieties and a marvelous amphora.

006b

Antillo is our Bolgheri Rosso which explores the more traditional style of our area.

The local wine history is ancient, as in all of Italy. Today Bolgheri is essentially linked to international varieties, but in the past there were also other more ancient ones. Among the red ones, there were above all Sangiovese, Canaiolo Nero, Malvasia Nera, Alicante (called Cannonau in Sardinia), etc. All these varieties were always vinified as a blend, a field or cellar one (many of these are present in the Campo Giardino vineyard, which originates our wine Jassarte).

The Sangiovese was however the leading one and, with Canaiolo, it will remain the main red variety for almost the whole of the twentieth century. In fact, these will be the two most important varieties of the first DOC born in the territory, in 1983, in the production of Bolgheri DOC Rosato (rosé)

The decline of Sangiovese began in the 1980s, the decade that saw, with the early 1990s, the most radical transformations of local production. Despite this, it was still maintained with the substantial modification of the DOC Disciplinary in 1994, admitted in the production of Bolgheri red and rosé wines for a maximum of 70%. In 2011, with a new modification, it was downsized even more, admitted for a maximum of 50%.

However, the persistence in the DOC Disciplinary has not prevented its almost disappearance: today Sangiovese represents less than 1% of red varieties in the Bolgheri vineyards. We are among the few to have it in our vineyards and among the very few to use it in a Bolgheri DOC wine.

We had wanted to keep it for historical reasons. We have evidence of the presence of Sangiovese in our vineyards from the beginning of the nineteenth century, when our farm became part of the great Espinassi Moratti estate (in 1820-1821), which has left a very detailed documentation.

However, re-proposing this historic grape-territory bond is not only a nostalgic operation, but allows us to create a wine with a very well-defined character. It differs considerably from our other Bolgheri (Rute and Atis, Bolgheri Superiore), which instead represent our expression of the contemporary local production.

Antillo is our youngest Bolgheri, characterized by a great freshness and very fruity aromas. The blend with Cabernet Sauvignon accentuates its complexity and enriches the structure. Finally, a small part of Petit Verdot contributes to its liveliness, as well as giving intense spicy notes.

 

The 2019 vintage presented intense climatic contrasts, but in general we consider it very good. After a rainy winter, the spring started hot and dry. Then, May was characterized by rain and low temperatures, with delay in all the subsequent phases of the vines. The summer had very hot peaks, but without humidity. The harvest period was later than usual, as expected, but always characterized by good weather. We harvested the Sangiovese and the Petit Verdot on September 24th, the Cabernet Sauvignon in the first days of October. The vintage gave rise to a wine that, as usual, is very fine, pleasantly acidic, with intense fruity aromas, especially of strawberry and cherry, and spicy aromas, where black pepper prevails. The great freshness counterbalances an important structure (it is over 30 g / l of dry extract) and makes it very drinkable.

 

Everything of this wine concerns the vineyard: from the name (Antillo means "sunny place", a perfect description for our territory) to the design on the label, which represents leaves and bunches of vines from an Etruscan amphora.

The picture of leaves and bunches of the Antillo label comes from the Hydria Ricci, a famous amphora from 530 BC. approximately, found in Cerveteri and kept in the National Etruscan Museum of Villa Giulia in Rome. Ricci is the name of the archaeologist who found it. What is a hydria? This name indicates the particular form of amphora that was used to contain water in ancient banquets, that was always mixed with wine before the consumption.

 

ionianRicciHydria

On the shoulder of the amphora, turning all around, there is the intertwining of vine shoots and ivy from which I designed the label of the Antillo. The vine and the ivy are the two symbols of Dionysus. Do you see that the leaves are different? Those of ivy are similar at the spade symbol of the playing cards. The vine leaves are trefoil and with dots on the edges, perhaps to simulate serration. The grape bunches are well recognized from the ivy berries.

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We see a sequence of very animated actions of characters under this pergola, which perform animal sacrifices, then cook them, and draw wine from amphorae. A bearded man (on the left in the detail of the amphora below) holds the kantharos, a two-handled cup used for wine and symbol of Dionysus. With the other hand, he points to a large grape bunch above him.

It seems that this complex scene celebrates the introduction to humanity of the cultivation of the vine, with the sacrifices necessary to guarantee a good harvest. The important character could be Dionysus himself or Icarius, the first man (according to Greek myths) to receive the teaching of viticulture from the god, or Maleas, the helmsman of that myth that tells of when the Etruscans kidnapped the god of wine (which I have described in the last part of this text here). On the body of the amphora there are mythological scenes that are linked to the stories of Heracles and Achilles.

I won't dwell on it: if you want to know these beautiful myths and their symbolisms in detail, I refer you to this short video where the director of the Villa Giulia museum tells them. If you don't understand Italian, however, you can admire better the pictures on the amphora.

 

https://youtu.be/g9LFjG4En2M

 


Top prize to our wine Atis Bolgheri DOC Superiore by Bibenda

Thanks so much to the staff of Bibenda, for the important prize to our wine Atis Bolgheri DOC Superiore 2017!


Thanks to our visitors and new opening hours

Our seasonal opening ends with October. Thanks so much to people who visited our winery in the last months, from Michele, Katrin Jadranka and me.

We tasted our wines together. You saw where and how we work, you explored the wine history and culture in our little museum. We told you about Bolgheri, Etruscan winemakers, wild and domesticated vines, craftsmanship production and care of the vineyard, co-fermentation, modern and pre-phylloxera period vineyards, sustainable innovation and much more. It has been a great pleasure for us.

We continue with the guided tours with tastings, by reservation only. It is also possible the wine purchase during our office hours (or by delivery via courier).

The visits will be possible unless there are a new closure due the virus Covid-19, of course.


Atis, TreStelle Oro prize

Our wine Atis Bolgheri DOC Superiore 2017 has received an important Italian prize, by the Veronelli Guide 2021, the Tre Stelle Oro (Three Golden Stars). Thanks to the Veronelli's staff.

 


Rute wins the TreBicchieri Award by Gambero Rosso

Michele and I were amazed when we learned that Rute had won the TreBicchieri Award by Gambero Rosso. We were surprised that Gambero Rosso had decided to reward not only the top Bolgheri wines, such as the Superiors, but also the Reds (the entry level). We are happy with it.

Thus, Rute also enters the group of our wines that have received critical acclaim,  after Atis, Jassarte and Criseo. And it made it with a very important prize. It confirms, once again, that our entire production is of great value.

If I have to describe Rute ("red", in Etruscan) in one word, I would say elegance. Unfortunately, this word is very overused, even for wines that are anything but elegant. Elegance is made up of fine and complex aromas, a right concentration that is lightened (but not trivialized) by a great freshness, which translates into gustatory verticality. Rute is a red that also has very good aging potential, which can reach 10 years.

These characteristics arise from the Genius Loci of our vineyards, among the hills of Bolgheri. It is a marine and windy area, a Mediterranean territory. In our hills there are strong summer temperature variations between day and night. Our soils are alluvial, very deep and well-drained.

The quality of a winery is truly measured on the basic wines than the top ones. If they also are good, it means that the vintner are able to work well always, where it is not easy and obvious. And with a pinch of pride, I say that our craftsmanship is always the same: we take care with extreme love of all our vineyards and every batch of grapes that enters the cellar.

Switching from highly aged wines to younger ones should not mean a decline in the quality of the grapes or less well working . It means working differently. Once the most suitable particles of vineyard for one or the other type have been chosen, it means working at best to help the vines find different productive balances, in order to have grapes with different balances and concentrations, perfect for the type of wine they will originate. So it will be in the cellar: there will be different routes, but equally cared for.


The vinification of the Roman era, the origin (2): the oenological practices

Continued from here

Let's enter into the detail of the wine production of the Roman era.

 

The oenological practices

In the first place, among the oenological practices, we must put the blend, in which a good part of the art of the good cellar man of all times lies. For example, Pliny mentions the Ligurians and the inhabitants of the Po area as used to blend sour wines with others that are lighter. Marseille wines are cited as excellent blending wines, because they are too intense to be consumed alone.

To improve poor wines, the less invasive practice was to aging them on the lees of a good wine. For example, the wine of Sorrento was put in dolii with the lees of the precious Falerno, to give it more flavor. At the time, they kept the quality lees by drying them in the oven, in loaves. The addition of lees was also a classic technique of the past to overcome the fermentation stops, even if (of course) they did not know they were inoculating with yeasts.

 

They had found a series of substances to be added to the wine with the aim of improving, especially for the production of the large amount of medium-low quality wines. As I told here, at that time there was a tendency to produce a lot of grapes, with the consequence of musts or wines which were poor of some elements or with more or less pronounced defects. Several of these corrections will remain at the basis of modern oenology, with the difference (not secondary) that today purified substances are used. All the toxic ones have also been eliminated.  However, today as in the Roman era, the best wines (which derive from balanced grapes) do not need it.

Pompei-Casa-Amorini-Dorati-12

A common addition was the cooked must, which was the "sugar" of the time (along with honey). It was obtained from overripe grape must which was concentrated by a slow boiling. Thus, it formed a very sugary, dark liquid, with a more or less caramelized taste and rich in aromas. During cooking, it also was possible the adding of fruits or flavoring herbs. In wine production, the cooked must was added to fermenting must to increase the sugar component of low quality grapes. Today, I remember that it is allowed to add concentrated and rectified must or sugar (the latter is not allowed in Italy). The cooked must could also be added to the finished wine and, in this case, they produced the so called "cooked wine". The use of cooked must remained for all the following centuries in Italy, especially in the center and south. However, the production of cooked must in Roman times was harmful to health, because it was mainly boiled in lead pots. During boiling, the lead diacetate (lead salt of acetic acid) is formed which has a sweet taste, also called Saturn's sugar, saccharum Saturni (Saturn was the alchemical symbol of the lead). Its ingestion, like other forms of metal assimilation, can cause serious problems of chronic toxicity. It includes mental damage, the alteration of various organs and blood. Some scholars have hypothesized that certain forms of madness attributed to some Roman emperors could be symptoms of the saturnism.

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They often added dried oak galls, outgrowths that form on the plant following the attack of parasites, the gall wasps (the Cynipidae, Hymenoptera insects). The galls have been used for millennia in the wine production because they contain a high percentage of tannins. These substances occur naturally in grapes and they are important components of wine, but they can be lacking in low quality products. Today, the galls are no longer added but purified tannins, as well as those obtained from oak or chestnut wood, from exotic essences, from grape seeds and grape skins. The tannins give a slightly bitter taste, so they must be carefully dosed, but they have several positive effects on the wine: they improve the structure and the body, they have a certain protective action (for example, they protect against the laccase, a deleterious enzyme for wine, which can be found in grapes attacked by gray mold), they help to stabilize the color, ...

helleboro_NG2

The addition of other vegetal elements also had a positive effect thanks to the contribution of tannins, such as olive stones or black or white hellebore (which contains gallic acid). At the time, it was thought that these plants had preservative effects on wine and that they were beneficial to health. On the contrary, the white hellebore contains a highly toxic hallucinogen. Yet, its use is often mentioned in antiquity, to enlighten the mind according to Petronius Arbiter (in the Satyricon) or as a remedy for madness for Horace (Third Satire, Book II) or against epilepsy. The black hellebore, on the other hand, is less harmful.

Pliny says that in Africa it was customary to add gypsum to wine, which was then eliminated by sedimentation. Adding plaster is a traditional practice commonly used until recently. It was typical of very hot areas, such as southern Italy and Spain. The gypsum was often scattered directly over the grapes, during the transport or during the pressing phase. This addition (remember that gypsum is calcium sulphate) has an acidifying action, with the secondary effect of reviving the color and clarifying the wine. In fact, the lack of acidity is a problem that can often occur in grapes produced in hot climates. The gypsum also slowly develops sulfuric acid in the wine, so it also has a light preservative action. However, it leads to an accumulation of sulphates, which are toxic above certain quantities. Today it is no longer used. Another product used as an acidifier in Roman and modern times was the alum (double sulphate of aluminum and potassium with 12 molecules of crystallization water), also no longer used.

On the contrary, to remove a too high acidity (a problem especially of grapes from cooler climates or not well ripened), they added marble powder or lime. Both of them bring calcium carbonate to wine, a substance used for millennia as a wine deacidifier. It is still used today, it is the cheapest, but it involves several problems such as the release of an excessive amount of carbon dioxide. Today the potassium tartrate (or other) is generally preferred.

Aggiungevano molti tipi di ceneri (incenso arso, cenere di radici di viti, gusci d’ostriche arse, cedro arso, ...). Tutte queste sostanze hanno l'effetto di incrementare diversi sali. L'effetto è quello di aumentare l'estratto secco e, quindi, di dare più corpo al vino. Anche queste aggiunte sono state usate a lungo nel passato ma oggi sono pratiche illegali.

There are some substances that, for the Roman authors, gave a generic improvement of the wine: clay, milk, egg whites, wild pea flour, ... I grouped them because today we know that they have the same function. They are the ancestors of various oenological practices still in use today, with a clarifying, refining and stabilizing function. They smooth out excess tannins and improve aromas. Today, the clay is still used but purified, like the bentonite or other similar products. The proteins of animal origin were used for a long time, such as the beaten egg white (the albumin), although today there is an obligation to indicate them on the label as allergens. After millennia of use, the milk is no longer used, but today there are still those who use an extract, the potassium caseinate. The flours of legumes, especially of peas, were used until not so long ago; today, vegetable protein extracts are used, which still derive mainly from these plants.

 

Other additions concerned the production of special wines, which were never blended with the normal ones. The addition of different herbs served for producing aromatized wines, such as those made with incense, roses, absinthe and much more.

Several wines imported from Greece (such as those from Chios, Kos or from Rhodes) were mixed with sea water, purified by decantation. The Romans took this use from the Greeks, but in smaller quantities. They believed that salting should be very precise, because the excess made the wine unpleasant and even harmful to health. Similar additions were also made until recently, with hydrochloric acid or table salt, but they are prohibited today. They were used to increase the chlorides in the wine, which may already be present a little (in different ways depending on the variety and the territory), with an effect of increasing the salinity and the dry extract (for a more full-bodied wine).

resina

Another ingredient of some Roman wines was the vegetable resin. In addition to being used to coat all wine containers, it was sometimes added to the wine itself, for a particular product called resimato or impeciato wine. This practice also came from Greece, where a resin wine called Retsina is still produced today. Today only the resin of the Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis L.) is used, but in ancient times many different essences were used, such as turpentine or terebinth (exudate of Pinus palustris L. and other Pinaceae), the mastic of the lentisk (Pistacia lentiscus L.), the resin derived from the seeds of ambrette or abelmosk (Abelmoschus moschatus L., an oriental Malvaceae), etc. The different types of resin were dissolved in olive oil and the must or wine was treated with it. The addition of resin seems to arise from the fact that it has a certain antiseptic action, which determines a protective action during fermentation, as well as a preservative action. However, it causes a strong aromatization of the wine, which is not appreciated by everyone. Curiously, I also found the resin in more recent oenological texts: the resinous smell is reported among the olfactory defects of wine in the late 19th-early 20th century. The professor Antonio Sannino wrote that it is frequently found in Trentino wines, due to the use of vats made with larch or fir wood.

 

The oenological practices were born to improve production but, over time, with the growth of the sector and the economic interests, they also degenerated towards strong adulterations. Unscrupulous businessmen used grapes of very poor quality, which were then heavily corrected in the cellars. In particular, they tried to cover the defects with very intense flavoring treatments.

These excesses were recognized and criticized even by the Romans themselves. Several authors write that they do not appreciate certain excessive aromatization, which altered the taste of wine or they considered dangerous to health. However, these wines had a market among the less privileged classes. For example, Pliny writes that Provençal wines were completely altered by an intense smoking and the addition of too many herbs, among which he feared that there were also some harmful ones. He also tells about the use of adding aloe to wine, to alter color and flavor. Some authors sarcastically write that they drink the Sabinus wine more willingly than many others, even if it was not among the most prized, because at least it was genuine and not too counterfeit. Although there was this perception, they never created a legislation to regulate the sector and put a limit on the additions made to wines.

 

The wine aging

QUADROAMORINI

The aging of wines in Roman times (to age = vetustescere) was done with heat. It was made only for the best wines, which were decanted in amphorae, closed with cork and carefully sealed. After that, they were left under the sun or in warm rooms. These amphorae were found by the archeologists almost everywhere in Pompeii: in the atriums of the houses, under the arcades, in the attics, in the kitchens, in rooms specially heated with furnaces (hypocaustum), ... After a certain period of this treatment, they were stored in the fresh cellars. These aged wines, according to ancient testimonies, could last a very long time and were considered among the most renowned wines.

How could the taste of these wines be? We can find an answer to this question by looking for the use of heat for aging in times closer to us.

There is a wine that is still produced today with a system that closely resembles the Roman one. This is the Madeira, produced in an archipelago of Portugal, located off the northwest coast of Africa. The wine is added with sugar cane alcohol and then treated with the heat (around 50°C) for several months, in containers kept in rooms heated by stoves or left under the sun. This tradition of the heat use does not seem to derive from the memory of the ancient Roman use. The official history of Madeira wines tells that it was a recent rediscovery, which dates back to the 16th - 17th centuries. In this period the wine of the island began to be transported frequently by sea and they noticed that it matured remarkably when it crossed the equator twice. However, this wine has strong oxidative notes and is very stable, capable of very long aging.

Can we hypothesize that the aged wines of the Romans were similar to Madeira? The production is very similar. It is possible, but we will never be sure.

 

Enotermo Carpené
Enotermo Carpené

However, the use of heat was not completely forgotten after the ancient times. It continued to be mentioned in the agrarian texts of the following centuries, from the Late Middle Ages onwards, but we do not know if it was still used or not. For examples, Andrea Bacci ("Natural History of Wines", 1596) writes that, in his day, wine was produced in a much simpler way than the accurate systems of ancient times, of which only a vague idea remained. However, we cannot exclude a priori that this technique was not yet used by someone.

However, there was a great return of the heat use for the wine aging from the second half of the nineteenth century and a part of nineteenth century. It was stimulated by the intense studies of the time on the nature of fermentation (see here), which led to Louis Pasteur's important discoveries on the role of microorganisms in wine, and of oxygen in aging. Thanks to Pasteur, the pasteurization was born, a moderate heat treatment of short duration, used for the wine preservation. So, the idea of using heat for aging also returned. In particular, there was a very high interest in finding much faster and cheaper ways of wine aging, compared to the long times and high costs of the passage in wooden barrels.

The heat has a preservative effect because it eliminates the microorganisms and proteins (enzymes) that can cause the wine to deteriorate. There is also an aging effect (also favored by the high temperature) adding a (more or less) controlled exposure to oxygen. I remember that at the base of wine aging there is always an oxidation process. When it is very strong, it origins wines with a clearly oxidized taste. If minimal, it leads to finer and more elegant transformations.

There were numerous studies that tried to define the practices for an optimal fast aging, defining the heat cycles, the temperatures (betwen 40° and 80°C) and the treatment times. It was important to avoid altering the taste of the wine with a "cooked" aroma. It was demonstrated, as the ancient Romans already knew, that this procedure was feasible only with wines of high alcohol content, of a certain power and good acidity, while the less intense ones were completely ruined. The Romans were mentioned only briefly, but similar systems were used, such as stoves for heating the rooms or for the bain-marie of the bottles, as well as exposure to the sun. There was also the creation of machineries for the continuous heating of wine, called “enotermo” in Italian, designed to treat even very consistent productions. They also studied systems that provided for the passage of electric currents in wine, a practice called "electrification", but they were abandoned quite soon. At the end of all these treatments, the wine was stored for a few months in the cellar at fresh temperatures.

 

mas-amiel-vino-3
I has not found images from old texts, but I came across this picture on the web. The photo is by Mas Amiel, a Roussillon (French) winery , which yet produces aged wines with the traditional sun exposure.

There was also a system of exposure to the sun, that was cheapest and least technological. It was made in clear glass containers, bottles or (more often) demijohns, not completely filled and well corked, left under the sun for some months. At the time, great importance was attached to the use of transparent containers because the antimicrobial action of sunlight on wine. We actually know that UV rays can have a sterilizing action, but also that they pass only minimally through the glass. The sun light has an effect of color altering.

Even if these heat aging systems were used for some time, the results were always quite controversial. However, from the texts of the authors of the time, it is not easy to understand what they meant by "good aging". For example, prof. Arturo Marescalchi made some tests with a wine (made with Freisa and Barbera varieties) in 1894, leaving some bottles in the July sun for 12 days. Some bottles were exposed to light, others covered with a black cloth and some, as control, were stored in the cellar. According to him, the best was the wine exposed to heat and light, which had become very old, with an orange color that today we would not considered so good. Some authors positively described these aged wine as similar to Madeira wines. However, many other authors disliked a so intense oxidation, because it standardizes the wines.

Professor Garoglio, in the 60s of the twentieth century, wrote that the success of heat aging was questionable and very casual. The results were quite appreciable in some cases, totally disastrous in others. In his time, the heat aging was still in use, but it was going to disappear. From the 1960s - 1970s, the use of aging in wooden barrels returned to growth, also thanks to the renewed economic capacity of the wineries. The pasteurization for conservation purposes was also increasingly abandoned for wine, while it remained for other foods (such as milk, beer and fruit juices). This treatment is yet permitted today. Perhaps there are those who use it, but without too much publicity, because it is not considered a very qualitative practice.

 

 

The poors' wines

foto02In ancient times nothing was wasted and wines of extremely low quality were produced for the poorest and the slaves. These practices of frugal peasant life will remain in use for centuries.

For example, the protropo wine was made with the must that Columella calls lissivo, that is the one that flowed by the weight of the grapes that were gradually accumulated in the pressing vat. Today, it would be like making wine with that liquid that remains at the bottom of the grape crates (especially if they have been a little too mistreated).

They produced wine also pressing used marc or lees, that were dunked in water for some days. These wines were called vini secondi (second wines) or lora. Cato calls the wine made with used lees vin fecato. These wines were very light and cheap, often used for servants and slaves. The practice of marc or lees wines has remained common over the centuries. Their production and sale, for consumption, was definitively prohibited in Italy in 1925 (royal decree n.2033 of 15/10/1925), because they were at the origin of many frauds (they were often saled as grape wines). In this period, they were still called second wines (vini secondi, in Italian), as in Roman era.

Is it possible to drink similar wines?!?!

Fayum-32

Consider that, until not so many decades ago, drinking quality wine for pleasure, as we do today, was only a privilege for the rich. All the other people drank wines that ranged from moderate to very poor quality.

However, in the past, even the worst wine had a significance. It added extra calories to meals that were often too light, as well as giving a little more flavor and a light alcoholic vivacity. Also, these everyday wines were considered healthier than drinking just water. Today we know why: even a low alcohol content protected from microbiological contaminations, which instead were very frequent and risky drinking water.

 

We talked about many wines produced in Roman times, with techniques that have remained almost until today. Some wines were very good, others not so bad, some heavily adulterated, others very very light. Whether they drank for pleasure, for health or for any other reason, we close the question with the Roman toast. Instead of our "cheers", they said:

"Bene vos" or "Bene nos" or "Bene te" or "Bene me", …

"Bene vos" "Bene te" (I wish you the best), "Bene nos" (I wish us the best), "Bene me" (I wish the best to myself), ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

“L’agricoltura di Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella” volgarizzata da Benedetto del Bene, con annotazioni adattate alla moderna agricoltura e con cenni sugli studi agrari d’Italia del cav. Ignazio Cantù, Milano, dalla Tipografia di Giovanni Silvestri, 1850.

“De re rustica”, Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella (60-65 d.C.), tradotto da Giangirolamo Pagani, 1846

“Interventi di bonifica agraria nell’Italia romana”, a cura di Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L’Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

“Il vino nel «Corpus iuris» e nei glossatori”, Cornelia Cogrossi, (2003) In: La civiltà del vino. Fonti, temi e produzioni vitivinicole dal Medioevo al Novecento. Atti del convegno (Monticelli Brusati, Antica Fratta, 5-6 ottobre 2001). Centro culturale artistico di Franciacorta e del Sebino, Brescia, pp. 499-531.

“Storia dell’agricoltura italiana: l’età antica. Italia Romana” a cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002

“Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell’Evo Antico”, M. R. Caroselli.

“Origini della viticoltura”, Attilio Scienza et al., Atti del Convegno, 2010.

“La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”, Luigi Manzi, 1883.

“Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”, Dalmasso e Marescalchi, 1931-1933-1937.

“Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”, Emilio Sereni, 1961.

“Il vino nella storia”, Enrico Guagnini, 1981.

Hugh Johnson, “Il vino, storia, tradizioni, cultura”, 1991

Tim Unwin, “Storia del Vino “, 1993

Antonio Saltini, “Storia delle pratiche di cantina, Enologia antica, enologia moderna, un solo vino o bevande incomparabili?”, Rivista di Storia dell’Agricoltura a. XXXVIII, n. 1, giugno 1998

E. Chioffi, “Anfore, archeologia marina”, Egittologia.net

“Storia dell’agricoltura italiana: l’età antica. Italia Romana” a cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002

“Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell’Evo Antico”, M. R. Caroselli.

"Il vino da pasto e da commercio", di Ottavio Ottavi, 1875, Tipologia Sociale del Monferrato, Casale.

"Trattato completo di enologia", di Antonio Sannino, 1914, Stabilimento di Arti Grafiche, Conegliano.

"La nuova enologia" di Pier Giovanni Garoglio, 1963, Istituto d'Industrie Agrarie, Firenze.

 


The harvest of the vineyard Campo Bianco

Campo Bianco is the vineyard where Criseo, is born. It is a single vineyard with 5 white varieties: Vermentino, Fiano, Verdicchio, Manzoni Bianco, Petit Manseng. This is a field-blend: all the grapes are harvested together and they are co-fermented. It is the oldest way to make wine in Italy, and it gives rise to a unique and ancient wine.

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We have started the harvest

Yesterday, September 15th, we started the harvest 2020.

Yesterday and today, we picked up the vineyard Campo Pietrini, where there is the Vermentino, our mainly white variety and the most ancient of our territory.

The grape is very good and healthy. This vintage is very interesting.

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Fall opening hours

The days are shorter and the harvest is coming, so we change our opening hours: from Monday to Saturday, 10.00-13.00 15.00-18.00

Visits and tastings are by reservation only. On Sunday, guided wine tours are possible for groups with at least 6 persons.

We are waiting for you!


The vinification of the Roman era, the origin (1): let's enter the cellar

I told you about the taste of Roman wine (see here). Then we walked for a long time in the vineyards of the time (see here, here, here, here here, here). Finally, we enter the cellar.

[one_second][info_box title="" image="" animate=""] The wine consumption in Rome: sobriety or vice?

Roberto Bompiani, fine XIX sec., "Una festa Romana"
Roberto Bompiani, end of  XIX sec., "A Roman party"

In our imagination we often associate Roman wine with banquets, with drunks in togas who puked their brains, due to many films or other representations that exalt the vices of the ancient world.

In fact, it is true that wine was consumed a lot in Roman times, but generally in a sober way. The prevailing culture was that which, more or less, remained in Italy: the wine was drunk almost exclusively with meals and without exaggerating, always diluted with water (to dilute the high alcoholic strength of the time). The only exceptions, like today, were the parties, the banquets. The excesses of some rich people were certainly not the norm.

The vice of drunkenness, called temulentia (from temetum the oldest word for wine in Etruscan and Latin) was rather frowned upon socially. For example, Octavian often accused Mark Anthony of loving wine too much, using this weapon to discredit him politically. True or not, Anthony is remembered yet today as a drunkard.

However, there has been a great evolution over the centuries. In the most ancient times, the wine was not abundant, both because the production was still limited, and because of the more rigid climate (see here the climatic changes of the Roman era). the wine was a luxury item for the most ancient Romans, reserved almost exclusively for banquets, for social and religious events. Later and thanks to theproduction expansion, it will be introduced more and more in common meals. Seneca says that the ancestors usually allowed themselves a little wine only at the end of the meal and considered those who drank it during the meal as glutton.

william_bouguereau_030_baccante_1894The strict customs of ancient Rome forbade wine to women. Wine was associated with the loss of control, hence the risk of adultery on the part of the wife. In the time of Romulus, Egnatius Mecenius killed his wife with stick for drinking wine and was even praised for the "exemplary punishment". Later in the history of Rome, women no longer risked their lives just for a little wine, but only a moderate consumption was socially accepted for the respectable ladies. For example, the judicial chronicles report the case of a woman who was fined by the judge, with the loss of her dowry, because she had secretly drunk more wine "than was deemed necessary for the health".

Over time, however, the production of wine increased more and more, arriving at large productions of low quality wine for the masses and a small elite of refined wines for the rich, and the customs became less and less severe. The consumption of wine became common for all the meals. In the Satires of Varro (1st century BC), he jokes about the meal without wine, calling it "prandium caninum", the dogs' meal (who certainly do not drink wine).

Arriviamo quindi all'epoca Imperiale, con gli eccessi celebrati nei tanti film in toga, dei quali Plinio dice di vergognarsi anche dal riferire. Nei casi più estremi, si poteva arrivare ad infilarsi una penna in bocca per indurre il vomito e poter ricominciare a bere e a mangiare.

During banquets, which were not necessarily always unbridled, it was customary to toast to the Gods, friends, lovers or the powerful. There was also the use of the nomem bibere (drinking the name): drinking as many glasses as there were the letters of the name of the beloved or the powerful to whom the toast was dedicated.

Pliny also reports the custom of "drinking the crowns", that is, lovers exchanged cups of wine with inside the petals of their crowns made of flowers and herbs. These vegetable wreaths, which became common at the banquets, were born from the belief that they would prevent drunkenness, by wearing them. Over time, they also became luxury items, made with the rarest and most fragrant flowers.

Among the many dark legends that circulated about Cleopatra, it is told of the time that, offended by Antony, she tried to poison him, offering him a cup of wine with the petals of her flower crown, which had been soaked in poison. At the last, however, she repented and stopped him before the fatal sip. Anyway, to teach a lesson to Antony, she made drinking the poisoned cup to a man sentenced to death, in front of him.

 

The_Roses_of_Heliogabalus Alma Tadema 1888 dettaglio

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Our harvest is very close and it seems to me very appropriate to talk about winemaking again. I do it, however, by going to its origins, to the Roman era.

However, I do not want to tell you about the terracotta amphorae and other generalities that we all know well, for the umpteenth time, if not for quick hints. Instead, I really want to enter a cellar of the time, with the spirit of the wine producer, and understand their techniques, beyond myths and prejudices.

You will certainly have read of those who report, with perplexity, that they added many strange things during the vinification: sea water, milk, olive stones, marble dust, wild pea flour and more. In reality, these practices are not as absurd as they may seem, as I will explain you later. Indeed, they represent the first rudimentary approaches to the modern enology. In this period, in fact, various oenological practices were born that will be developed later, both for better and for worse, with even an excessive adulteration of the wines.

In general, we can say that the Romans had developed a technically accurate wine production at their peak, as you will see, even if some aspects are incomprehensible to us (especially due to the scarcity of information). We don't forget also the objective limits of the time. Anyway, this production level will be lost in the early Middle Ages, with a marked deterioration in wine quality, and will only be regained after centuries, before the definitive leap towards the modern enology.

 

 

Light and shadow

At the moment of the peak, they produced different types of wine: still, sparkling, dry, sweet, raisin wine, ... All these wines were good enough to be drunk without corrections, apart from the usual dilution with water (necessary to dilute the high alcoholic gradations of the time, due to harvesting of overripe grapes; it is, however, a natural system of conservation). In the even more ancient times, the production techniques were very primitive and the wines were so bad that they always had to be corrected at the time of service with herbs, spices and honey and more (see here), to make them drinkable. The honey sweetening will remain, but only for a particular "cocktail", called mulsum, served as an aperitif. Herbal wines will also remain, for medicinal use or pleasure, but they were specific products.

Roman wine production has therefore evolved considerably over the centuries, starting from primitive systems. This development has depended by integrating the knowledge of the time (the Latin authors cite many references, overall of Greek texts, which we have not received), through an empirical experimentation, and a remarkable technological evolution of the instruments (about which I have already told here, speaking of Etruscans wine production). The most advanced Roman presses did not change until the 19th century.

The apex period is represented by the texts of Columella and Pliny the Elder (as we have already seen for the part of viticulture), in the second half of the 1st century. A.D. These texts describe an accurate wine production, without however granting us many details and explanations. They focus their attention above all on practices aimed at improving low-quality wines, the great mass of production. They also mention a small niche of wines of great value, for which, they write, any modification isn't necessary during the winemaking.

86406_hydrometer_lg

In the following period, there will be only some technological evolutions, such as the invention of the densimeter (hydroscopium), a tool for evaluating the density of liquids. As far as we are concerned, it is used to measure the amount of sugar and alcohol in musts and wine (opposite, a drawing of a more modern hydrometer). It is mentioned for the first time by Synesius, in a letter written to his teacher Hypatia, at the turn of the IV-V century AD. However, it seems that the common use dates back to the sixth century, as the grammarian Priscian recounts. This and other knowledge will be lost in the following centuries. A similar instrument will be invented again at the beginning of the 17th century.

However, there are still several inexplicable aspects for us in the production of wine from the Roman era. One of the most striking is represented wines with incredibly long aging, even of hundreds of years, that are praised by some poets. Considering that even today it is not possible to have such long-lived wines (which remain drinkable and pleasant), they were probably just hyperbole or poetic licenses.

Some important passages of winemaking are totally omitted in the ancient texts. For example, the maceration of the skins is never described. This fact has misled some modern authors of wine history, making them write that only white wines were produced , at the time. In reality, the Latin authors speak of a wide range of colors. Pliny writes about white, fawn (orange wine?), red and black wine. Galen also adds pale red (pink?) and pale, which he describes as an intermediate tonality between white and fawn.

 

In any case, the Romans certainly laid the foundations of some oenological practices, as I will explain you, but they did not know why they did them or why they added certain substances to wine, having no chemical knowledge on the compositions of musts and the products they used. They could just appreciate the final results. The other insurmountable limit of the time was the absolute ignorance on fermentation, as well as on microbiological alterations of the wine.

So, they might be good at making some wines, but they were always at the mercy of luck and chance. If something went wrong, they could do nothing and, simply, they downgraded the wine. However, this productive fragility does not belong only to the Roman era, it will remain for a long time. These processes will begin to be understood (and managed) only after the Pasteur's discoveries on the role of microorganisms in wine production, but we will have to wait until the second half of the nineteenth century.

Finally, let's not forget that, as in every past era, different realities coexisted: the richest wineries equipped with the most advanced tools, those (of all sizes) managed by educated or otherwise expert people, up to the many farmers who continued to making wine in a very primitive way.

 

Some core concepts

The Romans had already reached a certain awareness regarding some key concepts of wine production, which will be rediscovered only centuries after the end of the ancient era.

First of all, there is the importance of cleaning. They certainly did not know of the existence of microorganisms, they did not have our sanitizing products, the running water in the cellars and many other things. But they had realized how important it was to clean everything properly. The care and perfect cleaning of each container and tool, before and after each use, is a "mania" for the Roman authors, since the most ancient times of Cato. This way of working will be recuperated, in modern times, only quite recently. The cleaning of the wine containers was facilitated by the internal coating, made with vegetable resin, renewed with each use after having thoroughly scraped the old layer. They also recommended carefully cleaning them of any residual odors. In a cellar in Stabiae (today Castellammare di Stabia, in Campania), found totally intact by the archaeologist Fiorelli at the end of the eighteenth century, the grape pressing room was covered on the floor and the walls with a material made of crushed bricks and slaked lime, up to about one meter and eighty in height, with the limit marked by a red line. Lime is the oldest way to sanitize walls subject to the humidity. Its alkalinity prevents the development of molds and other microorganisms.

villa-regina-pompei

They also understood the importance of temperature during the winemaking process. Columella recommends bringing the wine containers to hot or cold places, as needed, or to have anphoras in different positions. He writes that if you feel the temperature rise too much by touching the wine amphora, you will certainly not have a good vinification. Today we know that fermentation yeasts work well at certain temperatures. Especially too high temperatures can compromise the process. In a cellar in Pompeii, an ingenious system was found to cool wine amphorae. These were leaned against a clay cavity in which fresh water was made to flow. In the description of the production of sweet sparkling wines, we read that the amphorae were transferred at a certain point in cold water tanks (to stop fermentation and leave a sugary residue). As still today, the cold was an ally of the cellar men to favor the processes of sedimentation and then racking of wines. In Late Empire texts, the importance to have fresh cellars is emphasized. If this was not the case, it was necessary to take advantage of temperatures seasonal changes to make certain operations. The ancient authors often link certain oenologist practices to some constellations (or other) for this reason: it is not a question of astrology, but their way of indicating the most appropriate seasonal moment.

They also understood the risks of wine oxidation (for them a generic alteration). In fact, the authors write to avoid exposing the wine to the air, especially at high temperatures. In the description of each winemaking step, the authors insist a lot on always having the containers carefully covered internally with vegetable resins and well closed.

 

Foulage_et_pressurage_bas_relief_en_marbre_dessin_de_Zoega_1808

The cellar and the winemaking

The production of wine was not so different from that of any winery of the past, at least until the nineteenth century, except for the wine containers.

The grapes were pressed with feet in the "palmenti" (stone or masonry tanks). The pomace or the whole bunches (closed inside wicker baskets or other material) were pressed. As we know, the main winemaking vessels were large terracotta containers called dolii (dolium in the singular), covered internally with vegetable resin, partially or completely buried. Their oldest name was calpar, already no longer in use at the time of Varro (1st century BC). There were also closed masonry tanks, although less widespread.

What was the purpose of the internal covering with resin of wine amphoras? It was made by resins of vegetable origin, which are substances of different nature produced by numerous plants, sometimes following wounds or parasitic attacks, so they are often also natural antiseptic. They have been used for thousands of years, for the most diverse uses, before the introduction of the synthetic resins or other materials. Often, they are also aromatic and we don't know how much this coating affected the taste of the wine or not. This coating certainly served to make these containers as inert as possible, as we try to do even today. The resin coating seals the porosity of the amphorae, against the risk of oxidation and makes them perfectly impermeable to liquids. It also guarantees a certain cleanliness, against the risk of microbiological contamination, since after each use the pots were carefully scraped from the old resin layer and re-coated.

mosaico_gallo_romano

They considered important to evaluate the foam, that forms on the liquid, to understand the good proceeding of the fermentation. In particular, they describe one of the most common alterations of wine until not so long ago, the "fioretta" (I was not able to try the word in English). They describe it as a clear film, like a spider's web, on the surface of the wine. The altered wine became tasteless and flat, with a more or less intense aroma of vinegar. Above all, it happened for wines with a low alcohol content that remain too much in contact with oxygen. Now we know that it depends on the development of different species of aerobic bacteria.

After the fermentation, there was a period of aging on the lees. Then, they were poured into new containers, in the month of May. It was the moment to classify the quality of the product, through the tasting. The wine acidity was considered a very important parameter: if it was too low, it was not a good sign for the shelf life and quality of the wine (as we know even today).

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The low-quality wine, or that to drink young, was usually placed in new dolii (so it was called vinum doliare), from where it was taken for the sale or the consumption, pouring it into jugs or other. The transport by land was made by a large leather wineskin, called culleus or uter vini, placed on a cart.

The best wine was put in amphorae and for this reason it was called vinum anphorariarum. This container was used for storing, aging and shipping. The amphorae were always covered inside with vegetable resins, carefully closed with corks which was sealed with resin, clay or plaster. They were identified by a nota, that is, a brush writing made directly on the amphora or on a parchment or a strip of leather. This old kind of label was called pittacium. The nota reported the wine type (for example, the abbreviation rubr. means red wine), the place of origin and the year in which it was stored. Especially from the 2nd century AD., the wine could also be stored and transported in wooden barrels (cupa), and it was called vinum de cupa. Pliny already describes them in the second half of the first century BC, as typical of the area of the Alps.

To move the liquids (must or wine) from one container to another, long siphons were used, or smaller transport containers (amphorae or other). In more rich cellars, as in one found in Stabia, the grape-crushing area had a sloping floor towards a drainage channel, where lead pipes (fistula) could be inserted to carry the wine into the fermentation dolii. The aulon sysetera was a glass instrument used to take small tasting samples from the wine containers, similar to the wine tester (or pipette) still used today.

To eliminate sediments and lees, they used the system that has always been used in the cellars, i.e. the decanting after allowing the sediments to settle on the container bottom. For the cleaning and filtration of wines, the authors tell us of a colum or saccus vinarius, a basket or colander made of wicker, mat or rushes, in the shape of a cone (below, a similar nineteenth-century one).

 

CONTINUE ... with the oenological practices.

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

fine ottocento filtrazione per vini bianchi soprattutto in uso in Toscana somo le cole da vino cioè sacchi di cotone conici

“De re rustica”, Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella (60-65 d.C.), tradotto da Giangirolamo Pagani, 1846

Luigi Manzi “La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”, 1883

Dalmasso e Marescalchi, “Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”, 1931-1933-1937

Emilio Sereni, “Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”, 1961

Enrico Guagnini, “il vino nella storia”, 1981

Hugh Johnson, “Il vino, storia, tradizioni, cultura”, 1991

Tim Unwin, “Storia del Vino “, 1993

Antonio Saltini, “Storia delle pratiche di cantina, Enologia antica, enologia moderna, un solo vino o bevande incomparabili?”, Rivista di Storia dell’Agricoltura a. XXXVIII, n. 1, giugno 1998

E. Chioffi, “Anfore, archeologia marina”, Egittologia.net

“Interventi di bonifica agraria nell’Italia romana”, a cura d Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L’Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

“Storia dell’agricoltura italiana: l’età antica. Italia Romana” a cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002

“Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell’Evo Antico”, M. R. Caroselli.

 


Grapes do not like sunbathing

In August we love the sea, the sun, and the tan. We can protect ourselves with a good sunscreen but grapes can't, so they don't like sunbathing or, better, the direct exposure to the torrid rays of the sun, which are particularly intense in our area.

In the very important period of ripening, we winemakers also evaluate the exposure of the bunch. We decide if the defoliation is necessary, that is the removing of some leaves around the bunch, or not.

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In general, the grapes need to be a little covered by leaves, however it depends on the climate and each particular situation. Especially, in hot climates and with intense solar radiation such as in Bolgheri (and for a large part of the center and the south Italy), grapes could undergo serious problems, if too exposed.

 

 

The defoliation.
Grappolo-con-botrite
The molds and rots of the bunches (in the photo: gray mold) are a great damage for the winemaker. The damaged grape is lost. There are anti-mold products, but they are not sustainable. These diseases are a risk for areas with a humid (rainy) climate in August and autumn. In dry climates, they are a problem only exceptionally, in particular vintages. The only defense of the winemaker is the prevention, which is done by defoliation, but not only. The microorganisms responsible for mold and rot of the bunch enter the grape if they find micro-cracks in the peel, which are caused by other parasites or diseases or various breakages (due to production imbalances, accidental blows, hail, etc.). So, prevention is also done thanks a general good management of the vineyard, for the balance of the vines, as well an optimal pest management.

In the cooler and (above all) humid territories, defoliation in the last stages (from the veraison to few weeks before the harvest) is often necessary. Removing a little vegetation serves to avoid stagnation of humidity, micro-conditions that can favor the terrible rot and the mold of the bunch, with the consequent loss of the grapes. This need may also be present in our Mediterranean area, but only exceptionally, in particularly rainy vintages.

Normally, however, a balanced vine does not require defoliation. Scholars give us some parameters: the coverage is optimal up to about 40% -50% of the bunches surface.

However, if the vine is too lush and the excess of leaves completely covers the bunches, the defoliation can be favorable, especially in environments without intense sun radiation. In this case, the experimental tests showed that the lightening of the vegetation and the better exposure improve the maturation (favoring the increase of sugars, the increase of the color, there are more primary aromas, less acidity, a better accumulation of compounds phenolic).

If you decide that it is the case to remove the leaves, however, you must also understand how much to remove and how. So, it is a handiwork that should be done only by expert people, able to decide for each singular vine.

The leaves should not be chosen at random. It is better to remove the basal ones, which are under the bunch. They are the oldest but also those not directly involved in photosynthesis in favor of the ripening bunch. This role is instead played by the leaves above the fruit, which it would be better to eliminate as little as possible, except for those that are too shading.

In general, however, it is always better not to remove too many leaves, otherwise the plant's photosynthetic capacity (therefore the quality of the grapes) is limited. How many leaves we need? It depends on many factors: the climate, the intensity of solar radiation, the variety (for example, it also affects the size of the bunch), the vine training system, ...

 

 

The excess of light and heat.

In our territory, if the vines are in balance, as mentioned, we mostly avoid the defoliation: there are almost never any phytosanitary risks related to humidity, except in particular years. In particular, we want to avoid damage from excess of light and heat.

Numerous studies have shown that, in warm areas and with intense solar radiation, the optimal situation for ripening grapes is a microenvironment in which the bunch receives diffused light, with some flashes of light that infiltrate the vegetation from different directions.

In these climates, there is no fear of the scarce accumulation of the various grape components. On the contrary, there is a risk of too high sugar concentrations which lead to too high alcohol levels, inelegant aromas and poor color.

Excessive heat and drought, for grapes exposed directly to sunlight, can also lead to serious damages, as phenomena of dehydration of the berries, with the synthesis of unpleasant aromas, the degradation of some aromatic precursors, up to real "burns", which cause browning and necrosis of the tissues of the fruit.

foto da Edagricole: grappolo di Sangiovese con acini scottati e disidratati
Picture by Edagricole: a Sangiovese bunch with burned and dried berries.

These serious damages occur more often to those bunches that have grown in diffused light and are suddenly exposed to sunlight. It can happen because of the vintner, who makes a mistake in managing the vine canopy, but also for unwanted events (for example the fall of the leaves due to pest attacks, etc.).

The problem is not only the direct light but also the temperature, which plays a relevant role in ripening, especially on color and aromas, and can become excessive for the bunches not sufficiently protected by the leaves. Studies have shown that summer temperatures of 35°-40° can inhibit the synthesis of anthocyanins (the color of red grapes) but also degrade the pigments that have already been produced. The high temperatures also seem to cause a degradation of the aromatic precursors (e.g. carotenoids), that is, those substances that are not aromatic in the grapes but will become aromatic in the course of winemaking. High temperature fluctuations between day and night, as happens in Bolgheri (especially in the hills), can also optimally balance certain excesses of daytime heat.

Only our continuous good work in the vineyard allows optimal ripening. There may be that few bunches can escape the protection of the leaves of an optimally managed canopy. We will take care not to collect it, with the selection during the harvest, as we do for every berry that is not exactly perfect.

 


Climate change, laws and harvest: the last steps in the Italian vineyards during the Roman times.

(continued from here)

We are concluding our journey through Italian viticulture at Roman times, with the latest works from the vineyard and the harvest.

First, however, I would like to complete the picture of the time with the description of the climate. The climate changes have had great importance in the historical events of humanity, all the more so as regards the evolution of agriculture.

oni – 1350 d.C. Il clima è freddo con oscillazioni a fresco/umido e mite. Le aree coltivate si riducono a favore del bosco, delle sodaglie, delle terre a pascolo e delle paludi. Durante il basso medioevo imperversa una grave crisi demografica: tra l’inizio del XIV e la metà del XV la popolazione italiana scende da a 7-8 milioni, forse meno – 1550 d.C. Il clima è fresco. In Italia si passa dal basso medioevo al Rinascimento – 1850 d.C. Piccola Era Glaciale (LIA). Il clima molto freddo (fino a 2 °C sotto la media) e instabile favorisce il ripetersi di carestie ed epidemie. I ghiacciai su tutta l Europa avanzano, il limite altimetrico del bosco nelle aree montane si abbassa, le precipitazioni e la portata dei fiumi aumentano dando luogo a una dilatazione delle zone umide. Ne consegue un generale peggioramento delle condizioni di vita soprattutto nelle aree montane d.C. – presente. Il clima è caldo. Il progressivo aumento delle temperature (con una temporanea inversione di tendenza tra il 1940 e il 1975) provoca un nuovo regresso dei ghiacciai e un innalzamento del livello marino. Ricostruzioni di sintesi della temperatura durante l’Olocene (iniziato convenzionalmente circa anni fa).

The foundation of Rome (753 B.C.) occurred in a period of small ice age (in the graph, it is the first blue descending peak), which lasted from about 900 to 300 B.C. This means that, in the first centuries of the Roman era, Italy had a decidedly colder climate than what we are used to today. The graph on the side shows the annual average temperatures from the Ice Age to today. The final vertical line represents our period.

Numerous Roman authors testify to the terrible winters of those periods. Columella and Juvenal say that, at the beginning of the fourth century BC, the winters were so severe that the Tiber was covered with ice. The woods of Latium and Etruria were constantly covered with snow. The winter of 399-400 B.C. remained in the history of Rome because of an incredible snowfall. More than 2 meters of snow (7 feet) fell. The collapses of trees and roofs throughout the city caused numerous deaths and wounded. Varro tells of very long winters in the Italian mountains. Saint Augustine reports that, still in the winter of 275 B.C., the Tiber froze and Rome remained under the snow for 40 days.

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How can we imagine the viticulture of that period? We don't have references. We can think that it was present above all in milder areas, such as the coasts or other favorable areas, up to not very high altitudes.

After that, the climate started to undergo a remarkable change, with the rise of temperatures, up to the moment called the Roman Optimum Climatic, a hot period. It lasted from about 250 B.C. to 400 A.D. and locally affected Europe and the North Atlantic. The climatic passage towards higher temperatures corresponds with the expansion of Rome in the Mediterranean. In ancient times, in fact, the sailing was possible only during the favorable seasons. The better climate allowed longer sailing periods. It also corresponds to the exponential increase in Italian viticulture. The warmer climate allowed it to expand even in areas that were previously unfavorable. Thus, the massive export of wine also began.

campi-elisi1

The increase in temperatures determined, in general, the shift to the north of the Mediterranean crops line, such as the olive tree. Pliny writes that the beech, which previously only reached the height of Rome, pushed its habitat to the north of Italy. Then, the hot period favored the spread of viticulture by the Romans in most of Europe, even in the territories that had never seen the vine before. They took the vines up to England, as well as to considerable altitudes. From many of these extreme areas, the viticulture will disappear with the subsequent Little Ice Age

Instead, a cooling period began from around 400 A.C. According to several scholars, the instability and the climate worsening, with the consequences on agriculture and people's health, contributed to the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

 

It is not known exactly how much the human activity of the time could have influenced climate changes. We know, however, that the Roman era recorded the first massive human interventions on the transformation of the Italian natural landscape.

In pre-Roman times, Italy was made up of immense expanses of woods, interrupted by marshy areas in the coastal areas or in the plains. Only a very small part was occupied by agriculture, restricted around the colonies of Magna Grecia in the south or the city-states of central Italy.

For example, the vast area between Aquileia, Ravenna, Mantua, Brescia, Reggio and Como was all marshy. The Adriatic, Tyrrhenian and Ligurian coasts were covered with dense forests, from which timber, considered valuable for the size of the trunks, was taken. The hills of Rome themselves, such as the Palatine Hill or the Quirinal Hill, were covered with woods. Between Modena and Bologna, the forests were still so dense in the Republican era that they considerably slowed down the construction work of the Via Emilia. Livy says that the Cimino forest in Etruria was more terrifying than the Germanic ones described by Tacitus. The Cisalpine Gaul (north of Italy) was very rich in oaks, in fact it was the main breeding center for the empire's pigs. The Gargano promontory, in Apulia, was covered with oaks and other trees that reached the sea.

 

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bacchus-roman-god-of-wine-web

«Sed etiam a vinea, et balneo, et theatro nemo dubitat
in ius vocari licere».

(Gaius, Liber I ad Legem XII Tabularum)

"It is not allowed to sue (bring to court) anyone who is in his vineyard, in the thermae or at the theater".

This sententia, cited by the jurist Gaius, is included in the most ancient written laws of Rome, the Laws of the XII Tables (Lex XII Tabularum) (450 B.C.). It shows how important the works in the vineyard were considered in the most ancient eras of Rome, to the point of also suspend legal proceedings. They had to wait for the vintner to finish his job.

In general, the importance of viticulture in Roman period can be understood from the large number of laws that concerned it, with respect to successions, sales, legacies, etc. In agricultural contracts, it was always recognized the increase in the value of a land in which a vineyard had been made. In the event of early termination of the rental contract, also due to arrears, the owner had to indemnify the tenant farmer who had planted vines there.

There are also numerous court cases concerning the vineyard, which offer us not always edifying scenes of the life of the time. For example, the jurist Sextus Pomponius tells of a man who, taking advantage of the great luxuriance of the vines (trained to the trees) of the neighbor, collected and sale the fruits from the shoots that stretched up to the trees of his property. At one point, the owner of the vines noticed it and he wanted to cut those branches. The man opposed the cut, and he sued the neighbor to prevent it to him. However, the court ruled against him, reiterating that the branches always belong to the owner of the land where the vines are planted, wherever they go.

 

In ancient Rome, there was the first example in the history of a government intervention to regulate the planting of vineyards and, therefore, the wine market. In 92 A.D., the famous Domitian's Edict prohibited the planting of new vineyards and introduced the obligation to destroy half of those in the provinces. According to some scholars, the edict was born in a moment of general stagnation in the wine trade. In particular, the Roman patricians, who were wine producers, did not want to have external competition. Cicero already had protectionist intentions when he wrote in De Re Pubblica (55-51 BC): "We do not allow the Transalpine peoples to cultivate the olive tree and the vine, so that our olive growing and viticulture remain superior". According to others, the edict was also born from the choice to curb the excessive expansion of the vineyards that was taking place in that period, to avoid famines due to lack of wheat.

Louis-Figuier-Vignes-des-Gaules-arrachees-sur-ordre-de-l-e
This 19th century French lithograph (from "Les mervielles de industrie moderne", Louis Figuer, 1875) represents the idealized scene of the destruction of vineyards in Gaul, following the edict of Domitian, by Roman centurions. In reality, it is not known whether the destruction really took place. Certainly, there was a stop of the European viticulture, until the abrogation by Probus.

The subsequent decline of viticulture in Italy made the ban disappear and, vice versa, several emperors worked to stem this phenomenon. For example, around 275 AD, Aurelian distributed slaves free of charge to the landowners, from Etruria to the Maritime Alps, to expand their vineyards.

Instead, the ban on creating new vineyards outside Italy was lifted by the Emperor Probus, towards the end of the third century A.D. Probus finally allowed "all the Gauls and all the Spaniards and even the Britons to cultivate vines and make wine", and to "own the vineyards to the Gauls and the Pannonians" (Historiae Aug. Probus, 18, 8). He also introduced corves for the Roman centurions, dedicated also to the planting of vines, such in Germany.

 

Theod1

Towards the end of the ancient era, the Italian viticulture was in sharp decline also because it was oppressed by bureaucracy and ever more suffocating taxes. Cassiodorus says that the producers went so far as to cut their vines to avoid unsustainable taxation. In the Codex Theodosian Code (413 A.D.), it is written that those who cut the vines to escape the tax authorities were condemned to the death penalty and confiscation of property:

"Si quis sacrilega vitem falce succiderit, ..." 

If someone had cut down the vine with a profaning sickle ..." Cod. Theod. l. XIII. Tit. XI. leg. 1.

The Lombards will return to write laws for the vineyards some centuries after. [/info_box][/one_second]

disboscamento

These woods had always been used by man but, in Roman times, the population increased considerably compared to the past and so did the technical applications. The use of timber became massive, used as fuel, but above all for the building, in considerable expansion, and the construction of the great Roman naval fleets, ...

So, over the centuries, the Romans deforested a large part of the peninsula, also to make more space for agricultural land and pastures. Compared to today, however, there was still a big part of uncontaminated nature

In archaic times, the king Ancus Marcius had placed the woodland patrimony under the protection of the gods and the decemviral magistrates, declaring it Public Natural Property. More than a protection, probably, it was only an economic question: an important part of the public income derived precisely from the management of this patrimony. However, we know that the Romans themselves noticed the degradation that ensued from the intensive exploitation of natural resources. Pliny and other authors tell us about it, talking about landslides, floods, erosions, water shortages and agricultural problems, recognizing the human hand behind them

 

But, let's go back to the last works of the vineyard.

 

 

Green pruning

bipalium

The Roman agrarian authors tell of the various works that we include under the term "green pruning", at the time called vites pampinari. For Varo, it is even more important than winter pruning and must only be done by expert people. Already Cato mentions the work of pinching off the suckers, binding the shoots and tearing off the leaves. Columella also adds the topping and thinning of the bunches, completing all the works of green pruning, as in our day.

They used the cultelli minores, small curved knives, to take off the suckers. The shoots of the vines were tied so that they would not be broken by the tools and animals during the passage, taking care to direct them upwards. These choices were made without knowing the physiology of the vines, as today. It was an empirical knowledge, born from the careful and rational observation of the response of plants to the different ways to done the works.

In August, Columella explains, the leaves are removed around the fruits in the territories where the climate is cooler and rainier, to avoid the bunches rot. Instead, he advises not to do it in hot places, like we do today. He also tells how vines were shaded with wattle matts in areas with a torrid climate, as his uncle Marcus did in Betica (southern Spain).

 

 

Soil tillage
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Soil tillage and weeding were also important then as today. The operation was called fossio and who did it fossor. Virgil uses the verb jactare.

Where possible, it was always done with the plow pulled by oxen. Where it wasn't impossible the use of the plow, they worked with the simple spade (pala or ligo) or with the bipalium (a spade with a transverse bar, which digs twice the depth of the common one). The marra was a large, toothed head hoe. The rastrum and the sarculum were different types of rakes. The irpex was a heavy rake pulled by oxen, like the modern harrows

The Latin authors recommend hoeing the vine at least three times a year: one when it sprouts, the other at flowering and the third for ripening. The vineyard with young vines must always be carefully dug to remove all weeds. These works are essential even today, even if done differently, to remove the vegetation close to the vine and to avoid unfavorable competitions in delicate moments of the life of the plant.

Another job was to dig out the soil under the vines (ablaqueare or circumfodere) with the dolabra or the dolabella, which were small axes. At the time of Palladius it was said excodicari: the earth was lightly dug around the vine and the most superficial roots were cut. Then, in the territories with a cooler climate, the bases of the vines were covered again with earth in the winter. This traditional work is no longer practiced today.

 

 

Grape harvest

The grape harvest was an event linked to religious practices, mainly dedicated to Jupiter, as already described here. The Vinalia Rustica festivities took place on August 19th and they served to propitiate the good weather during the ripening of the grapes. During the festivities, the grape harvesters could make jokes of all kinds, even offending passersby, without them may to react. Cicero speaks of the Auguratio Vineta, augural practices before the harvest. The official start to the harvest was given by the festivity called Auspicatio Vindemiae, with a ritual officiated by the Flamen Dialis, the high priest of Jupiter. He collected the first bunch in a public vineyard and offered it to the god, making an animal sacrifice. The ritual had to guarantee a good harvest. The period of the festivity varied every year, in relation to the harvest period. Pliny the Elder instead mentions a magical ritual used to ward off bad weather: they put a bunch of fake grape in the vineyard that should have attracted damage to himself, saving the rest.

18

Instead, Columella writes about the search for rational methods to decide the ideal moment of the harvest. He examines the systems proposed by various authors, such as the evaluation of the softness of the berry, the color and brightness of the fruit, the fall of the leaves. This latter is not surprising, because at the time it was frequent the late harvest. However, according to Columella, these are not good systems because they can also depend on other causes besides maturity, such as the bad weather or other. There are those who taste the grapes but even this method can be misleading for Columella, because he says that it is not always possible to understand by the tasting the relationship between sweetness and acidity of the grape, especially for the sourer varieties.

According to Columella, the best and error-free system is to evaluate the color of the grape seeds:

The best thing, as I do, is to observe the natural maturation. Now, the natural maturity occurs if, after squeezing the grape seeds which hide in the berry, they are dark in color or black. In fact, only the natural maturity can give color to the grape seeds ... "(De Re Rustica").

httpwww.wining.it

In fact, the grape seeds are a good sign of the ripening of the grapes. At the moment of veraison (the moment of change of color of the berries), they change from green to yellowish or brownish, depending on the variety. Then, they become darker and darker. It is an objective parameter, good enough for the past. It has remained in use for centuries, although it is not very precise. In fact, it becomes increasingly difficult to evaluate the different shades of brown in the final stages. Today we evaluate a set of different parameters to decide the time of the grape harvest (see here). The grape seeds complete the information necessary, especially by tasting them on the maturation of the tannins.

Another recommended system in ancient times consisted in evaluating the growth of the size of the berries which, when ripe, stops. The suggested method is to remove a berry from a bunch and check it after some time. If the grape is not yet ripe, the other berries continue to grow and fill the void left by the removed one. When the berries no longer grow and the hole is not filled, the grape is ready. This system is also based on careful observation of what is happening in the vineyard. Like the previous one, it is a fairly good system but does not allow the precision that we are looking for now.

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In any case, this knowledge, like that related to other vineyard works, had advanced for the time. Let us remember that, most likely, they were known and put into practice only by those who had the culture to read the agricultural treaties of the time. Certainly, most of the winemakers collected the grapes without knowing these techniques and without great precision for maturity, as happened in the vast majority of the vineyards until not long ago.

Often, in the past, much winegrowers collected the grape in the same period every year, when the neighbor started, when there was time from other works, ... In ancient times, people also went to ask it to fortune tellers. In fact, Cato and Columella, in their texts, scold the winemakers who rely on astrologers, haruspices or other similar sources to decide the time of the harvest, instead of learning their craft!

 

 

When did they harvest?

Columella offers us the most precise testimony on the dates of the harvest, in his calendar of agricultural works (book XI of De re rustica). Columella wrote it in the second half of the first century. A.D., so in the Roman Optimum climate period. The harvest period seems very similar to ours.

In the monthly calendar of works, Columella begins to talk about the grape harvest in August, when he says that grapes are being harvested in lands with remarkably hot climates, such as Betica, in southern Spain (that of his Uncle Marcus) and north Africa. At the beginning of September, he writes, harvest begin in Italy in places near the sea and warm ones in general. In the second half of the month, he says that harvest is done in the great part of the vineyards. Finally, in October the harvest starts in the cooler areas. I remember that in the times of Columella the Julian Calendar was followed, we the Gregorian one, but more or less the months coincide.

 

The collection was done with small curved sickles, called falcula vindimiatoria. To reach the bunches of the vines trained to the trees, they used stairs. Pliny recommends to not harvest hot grapes or covered with dew, excellent advice also for today. The bunches were placed in baskets, as showed in many Roman mosaics or frescoes, or in wooden containers, as Cato writes.

 

 

How much did a vineyard of ancient Rome produce?

"Vinea est prima, si vinum multum siet"

Cato wrote in the second century B.C.: "The vineyard is the most convenient of the crops, if it produces a lot of wine".

In fact, in general, compared to our parameters, the production told by the Latin authors is really high, as we have already seen in preview with the wonderful vineyard of Palaemon (here).

santa costanza roma crisitanesimo-romano

During the Roman time, as in all past eras even closer to us, the value of the vineyard was linked to a high productivity, even if they recognized an appropriate reduction in yields for wines of great value. With the exception of this small part, the large mass of grapes was used to produce large quantities of cheap wine. The various ancient authors provide us with some estimates.

In Cispadania (currently Emilia Romagna and also part of the Marche) it seems that an average of around 10 cullei* of wine was produced per jugero* (about 200 hl/per hectare), with extreme peaks of 15 cullei (about 320 hl/ha). A lower yield is witnessed for central Italy. Do you remember the wonderful vineyard of Palaemon which, according to Suetonius, produced 360 bunches for each vine? Columella also mentions it, after it had passed under the ownership of Seneca, with a production of 8 culei per jugero (about 170 hl/ha). Columella states that it was better to stop using a vineyard if it had fallen below 3 cullei per jugero (about 65 hl/ha). Of course, the few precious vineyards were excluded from this consideration, for which the mentioned minimum is of 1 culleo/jugero (about 21 hl/ha).

Consider that today the average yield in Italy is around 100-120 quintals/hectare (108 quintals/hectare in 2019), which correspond to around 75-90 hl/ha. In Tuscany, where the average quality is very high, in 2019 the average yield was 66 quintals/ha, i.e. just over 50 hl/ha. (these data came from the very useful blog "I numeri del Vino", here)

Therefore, the Roman yields are enormous compared to ours, considering also that at the time the vineyards did not have the density of today. On the contrary, they were often in promiscuous cultivation. Thus, each single vine produced exaggerated quantities of grapes. We should also remember that the most common form of cultivation was the "married" vine (trained to a tree), which is very expanded form and leads to high production.

Some scholars have justified these numbers by thinking they were the maximum possible yields. There are those who argue that they should not be taken literally. There is the suspicion that some Roman authors may use a certain emphasis when they want to praise something. Certainly, the quantity, for mass production, was not lacking at that times.

We stop here for now, on the threshold of the cellar, with a grape basket on our shoulder. We will enter another time.

 

[alert style="warning"]*Units of measurement mentioned in this article:

The used unit of the capacity for the wine production was the culleus, which corresponded to a large wineskin of about 520 liters, the largest Roman volume unit. Below it, there was the amphora which corresponded to about 26 liters. It took 20 amphorae to make 1 culleus. The basic unit of measurement was the sextarius, which corresponds to just over half a liter (about 540 ml). 1 amphora = 48 sextarii.

The most used unit for agricultural areas was the jugerum, about 2553 m2, more or less ¼ hectare (which, I remember, is 10,000 m2). The basic unit was the actus quadratus, half of the jugerum.[/alert]

Bibliography:

"L'agricoltura di Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella" volgarizzata da Benedetto del Bene, con annotazioni adattate alla moderna agricoltura e con cenni sugli studi agrari d'Italia del cav. Ignazio Cantù, Milano, dalla Tipografia di Giovanni Silvestri, 1850.

"Interventi di bonifica agraria nell'Italia romana", a cura di Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L'Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

"Il vino nel «Corpus iuris» e nei glossatori", Cornelia Cogrossi, (2003) In: La civiltà del vino. Fonti, temi e produzioni vitivinicole dal Medioevo al Novecento. Atti del convegno (Monticelli Brusati, Antica Fratta, 5-6 ottobre 2001). Centro culturale artistico di Franciacorta e del Sebino, Brescia, pp. 499-531.

“Interventi di bonifica agraria nell’Italia romana”, a cura d Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L’Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

“Storia dell’agricoltura italiana: l’età antica. Italia Romana” a cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002

“Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell’Evo Antico”, M. R. Caroselli.

"Meteo, clima e storia. Le variazioni climatiche del periodo Romano". Marco Rossi, 2007.

“Studi sui Libri ad edictum di Pomponio”, Emanuele Solfi, 2002, ed. LEM

“Origini della viticoltura”, Attilio Scienza et al., Atti del Convegno, 2010.

“La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”, Luigi Manzi, 1883.

“Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”, Dalmasso e Marescalchi, 1931-1933-1937.

“Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”, Emilio Sereni, 1961.

“Il vino nella storia”, Enrico Guagnini, 1981.

“Il vino, storia, tradizioni, cultura”, Hugh Johnson, 1991.

“Contadini perfetti e cittadini agricoltori nel pensiero antico”, Valerio MerloAlce Nero.


2020 shirts

The official harvest shirts have arrived! 2020 is turquoise: the color of the sea, of tranquility but also of a new beginning, all of which we need this year.

019


The last Attilio's book wins the Biblioteca Lunelli Award

We have known, with pleasure, that the work of Attilio Scienza and Serena Imazio, "La Stirpe del Vino" (ed. Sperling & Kupfer 2018), English edition "Sangiovese, Lambrusco and other stories of vines", is the winner of the first edition of the Biblioteca Lunelli Award, an important italian prize for books on the theme of wine.


Summer opening hours

From the next week (from Monday July 6th), we will change our opening hours:
- from Monday to Saturday morning h 10.00-12.30 4.00-8.00 pm,
- Saturday afternoon 3.00-6.00 pm,
- Sunday by reservation only (for groups).
We are waiting for you!


Annalisa and Michele


Fertility and disease: reason vs superstition in the vineyards of ancient Rome ... and today

.... continued from here

As we have already seen in the previous posts, the Roman agricultural authors (see here), in particular Columella, generally tell of a very practical and rational viticulture, which arises from the experience and the careful observation of the phenomena in the vineyard, as we do today, despite the cognitive limits of the time. In the literary or historical works, the agricultural descriptions are very often mixed with the religious rites or the superstitious beliefs, which were certainly widespread in the countryside, especially in relation to the most difficult aspects to manage, such as the soil fertility and vine diseases, of which I tell in this post.

La-luna-e-i-suoi-influssi-in-agricoltura

The contraposition between reason and superstition in agriculture is ancient. Mixed between them, they have gone through all the centuries and they have come down to us, the era of the hoaxes and the false myths, which are proliferating more than ever as regards food and its production.

Already Cato disapproved on the winemakers who, instead of learning the vineyard techniques, went to the astrologers, the haruspices or the augurs (in the image below) to decide when to start the harvest or do other works, with bad results! Columella also tried to persuade on the uselessness of the divinations or the other superstitions, such as certain magical practices that were done in the countryside.

The religious rites of that time continued in the processions and blessings of the camps of Christianity, which remained in use until not long ago in our countryside. Today the religious dimension has almost completely disappeared. Instead, the irrational approaches, that seemed to have definitively gone in the modern era, are increasingly emerging in the recent years. Among other things, as you will see, they are very similar to those who were already deprecated by the agronomists of the ancient era.an-augur-of-ancient-rome-utters-mary-evans-picture-library

Is it possible that nothing has changed?

In the past, there was a real naivety towards the irrational, which was explained by the widespread ignorance. However, the today's generalized education does not seem to have changed much the situation. We seem more than ever at the mercy of false myths, hoaxes, fears, pseudo-ancient practices, etc.

On the other hand, I can understand that for many people it is not easy to defend oneself: there is a great confusion of information. The agriculture is now very far from the life of most people (and I'm not talking about growing a vegetable garden or an amateur garden). Too many experts or pseudo-such talk about it superficially. In addition, an important role is played by the marketing of food which, perhaps short of other ideas, seems to ride more than ever fears and false evocative stories, helping to consolidate myths or hoaxes.

You can say: what harm can it do? Unfortunately, a lot. We are already seeing repercussions which will become more and more important if we continue in this direction. There are effects on the agricultural policies, the rules, the scientific research guidelines, etc. Think of those practices or products used in agriculture that are prohibited or, vice versa, praised for irrational reasons, rather than real experimentation. In general, all these risks leading us to a general decline in agriculture, with influences on the quality and / or quantity of products and several problems on the future of the sector itself.

However, the ignorance and the superficiality in agriculture are plagues that have always existed, as Columella also tells us. In the preface to his work De re rustica, he already complained how much the agriculture was underestimated. Many people, he writes, attribute the depletion of the soils and the decline of agriculture to the fate, the weather adversity or anything else, while what is often missing is only the knowledge.

Columella invites us to reflect on the fact that, while everyone shares the idea that good education is needed to carry out most professions, the same does not happen for the agriculture, which is also among the most important activities, because without it man cannot feed himself. Yet, too many people practice it (or talk about it, I add) only with superficial knowledge. Thus, the agriculture gets worse and worse and imports of products become increasingly indispensable.

It seems written today!

 

However, let's tell now of the themes of the vineyard that interest us, the soil fertility and the vine diseases, and let's see how they were faced in the time of ancient Rome, both rationally and with the superstition and the magic.

 

 

Soil fertility and fertilization

The soil fertility problems are not only modern, but have always played a central role in agricultural concerns.

Since ancient times, the fertility was linked to unexplained events and therefore placed within the supernatural. It was viewed as a sign of favor by the gods or, with its absence, of punishment. All peoples, in all eras, have created religious rites, offerings, sacrifices or magical practices, hoping of having good harvests. Fortunately, however, the humanity has not remained firm only in these aspects: our farmer ancestors, with the reasoning and observation skills linked to the practice, understood that the land needed to be "nourished" with fertilizers so that it could continue to give us its fruits.

AgricolturaèVita

Today we know that fertility depends on a set of soil characteristics of a chemical, physical and biological nature. Thanks to them the soil is able to supply (or not) the mineral elements that serve the plants as nourishment. the loss of fertility depends on many factors. Each plant removes nutrients from the soil in which it grows, and it is maximum with an intense cultivation. They are also lost due to leaching phenomena (i.e. the dragging action due to the water passing through the soil), the problems of compaction, erosion, etc. The nutrients must therefore be reinstated in some way!

Returning to the viticulture of the Roman era, the agrarian authors recognized the great importance of the fertilizing of the vineyard. Today we know that the optimal nutrition of the vines is an essential factor for the wine quality. According to Columella, the fertilization must be "frequent, timely and moderate". Today, we would say something similar, even if more precise, according to the principles of the sustainable integrated viticulture: it must be done appropriately, only when and where it is needed, in response to the specific nutritional needs of each vineyard particle.

Cato recommends to use well matured manure, produced from sheep or horses. The bovine one was not considered optimal at these times. Today, the manure is still used, but it is often difficult to find, especially in the territories where there are no farms. As today, a great importance was also given to the fertilization made with green remains (branches of pruning, stalks, marc, grass, ...), which form compost. Today we also know that the manure and the compost are not always sufficient. I will talk about it again: it is a very complex topic.

oscillum_16736_lg

 

About the less rational aspects, the peasants had a lot superstitions and religious rites to increase the soil fertility.

Among the magical practices of the vineyard, I like very much the usage of hanging on the branches of the trees small masks of Bacchus, called oscilla (oscillum in the singular). The wind rotated them and it was believed that the part of the vineyard where the mask was turned would become very fruitful. (Virgil, The Georgics, II). They seem to me artistic installations.

Another more esoteric magical practice consisted in planting three goat horns in the earth around the plant to which the vines were trained (here I described the traditional Roman vine cultivation system, the vine "married" to the tree), with the part hollow upwards, slightly protruding from the ground. It was believed that the rain, which entered the horns and then passed into the soil, would give fertility.

cornoletame2-800x600

Several animals were often included in the propitiatory and fertility rites, through sacrifices or through the magical use of parts of their body (horns, bones, etc.). The anthropologists name it "magic by compensation", because these animals were considered very dangerous for the vineyard. In addition to wild boar, fallow deer, deer and roe deer, which damage the vineyards even today, then there was still a large wild bovine, the wild ox (Bos taurus primigenius L.). The oxen that worked the vineyard were muzzled, so as not to damage the vines and other plants. Another great danger came from the flocks that had escaped the control of the shepherds. The goat was considered the main enemy of the winegrower. Not surprisingly, it was the sacrificial animal par excellence to the god Bacchus.

unnamed5

The horns, in particular, have taken on many symbolic meanings among different peoples and in various eras, including those of strength and fertility, as well as protection from evil influences. By contrast, Christianity put them on the heads of devils. Today, they curiously return in to the vineyards.

 

Vine diseases.

The vine diseases are probably the weakest part of the texts of the Latin agronomists, including the great Columella. On the other hand, the good practice and observation skills are not sufficient in this field. They lacked of in-depth knowledge on the nature of diseases and pests, the vine physiology, chemistry, etc. They will only come from the nineteenth century onwards. Despite this, we can find an attempt at rational research in their writings which shows some interesting ideas.

As we shall see, even this problematic area easily fell prey to the superstitions and the magical practices, which are often the result of the impotence. The life of farmers from the past was certainly not easy.

1065_-_Roma,_Museo_d._civiltà_Romana_-_Calco_sarcofago_Giunio_Basso_-_Foto_Giovanni_Dall'Orto,_12-Apr-2008

Fortunately, our Roman ancestors (and for many centuries after) have saved themselves from the worst diseases of the vineyard, capable of truly bringing winemakers to their knees. They arrived in Europe only in the nineteenth century, from America: phylloxera, powdery mildew and downy mildew.

There were the local diseases. However, they are less destructive than the American ones: they mostly affect the bunch and, except in particularly severe cases, they can be better "endured" by the winegrowers (although losing quality and quantity of the production). Sometimes, the local diseases can be contained by eliminating the first signs of infection, or by making a selection of the bunches.

cocomero as. x 1
Elaterium

The Latin agronomists recommended for various diseases the use of substances that they thought to have "disinfectant" functions. They often suggested the use of the vinegar or elaterium-based poultices (Ecballium elaterium L., also called squirting cucumber or exploding cucumber), with which to rub the infected vine parts. The elaterium is a wild Mediterranean plant, used in the past also for its purgative effects, but abandoned for its high toxicity. There are not evidences of the utility of these compounds in the viticulture.

A recurring remedy was sprinkling vines with human old urine. We know it is not useful against the diseases. However, the urine gives nitrogen, a little phosphorus and potassium. Perhaps, it was recommended by the ancients because they observed a certain beneficial effect, simply as a form of fertilization. Actually, we know that the excess of nitrogen promotes certain vine diseases but, perhaps, at the time there were more deficiencies than abundances of nutrients.

 

To prevent diseases and problems due to frosts or humidity, Columella recommends burning piles of straw in the vineyards or spreading hot ash on the vines. Even today, the winegrowers try to avoid frost damage by lighting fires in the vineyard in the colder places.

 

Fiaccole per difendere i vigneti dal freddo nei Grigioni
Fires in the vineyard in the Grisons (from RSI Switzerland)

It is not easy to recognize the diseases and pests that we know to infest the vineyard from the descriptions of the Latin authors. They are too poor and vague, we can made only hypotheses. For example, they speak of vines that do not emit fruit, the leaves turn white and dry out. From the symptoms, it looks like a mold, most likely botrytis at an early stage. In this case, the recommended remedy was to rub the plants with very strong vinegar, mixed with ash, and pour it, diluted, on the roots.

They described diseased vines with the leaves that turning red (the esca desease?). The recommendation is to drill the trunk and to insert an oak branch or a stone, or nails, into the hole. Do not be surprised: cutting operations on the trunk are also done today with often positive results, because it is a disease that affects the lymphatic vessels of the plant and the wood. Another ancient advice was to cut the vines near the ground, cover them with some earth and dung and re-start the growing. This also makes sense, considering also that the vines were not grafts like today (because of the phylloxera).

 

VILLA_ADRIANO12larva-tignoletta-acino-e1525259466510

Several authors cite small beasts which create damage to the vine, which erode its tender shoots and fruits or which alter the leaves. Cato speaks of small "caterpillars". Plautus, an author of comedies, compares a particularly annoying character to the involvolus, who defines "bestiam et damnificam, quae in pampini folio intorta se", "an evil animal, which rolls up in the vine shoot" (La Cistellaria, Act IV, Sc. II, v.63). Pliny speaks of convolvulus and araneum (web), Columella about volucre. It is not clear whether they speak of the same or more pests. Some modern authors have thought of recognizing in certain descriptions the larval forms of the vine moth and the mites, parasites very common in the vineyards. Cato recommends the use of a mixture of cooked oily deposit, bitumen and sulfur. The latter is one of the oldest plant protection products. It is still used today in pest management, albeit against other diseases (powdery mildew). In certain situations, it can actually give secondary effects on mites.

Other ancient practices are instead truly inexplicable: they seem naive attempts or linked to superstitions and magical beliefs. Many things were burned or buried in the vineyard against disease and bad luck: horns, fishes, shrimps, various plants, goat or ox dung. They rubbed the sickles with bear's blood or with gelding skin, for "purifying" purposes. It was recommended to prune the vineyard on a full moon night to disinfest the vines closest to the houses from mice. Some recommendations in this sense are present in the Columella's latest book "On the Trees", whose attribution is however uncertain. According to several scholars, it could be a spurious work, perhaps by a certain Gargilius Martialis, who copied large parts of the writings the well-known author and introduced passages in his own hand, of a completely different level than the original treatise.

cranio-di-capra-secco-con-grandi-corna-su-una-pietra-con-i-raggi-del-sole-che-gli-battevano-sulla-fronte_72928-143Listen how this compound is prepared, which should keep vine diseases away. Collect some oak bark, removing it from the trunk with a planer, in early autumn. Finely mince the bark and put it in the skull of a pet, passing through the hole at the base (from which the spinal cord enters). Press well and close the hole with a bone fragment and clay. Bury the skull on the edge of a pond, in the presence of rotting plant material. In the spring, take off the content and dried it. Then, dissolve infinitesimal quantities of it in rainwater, mixing with certain movements, three times to the right and three to the left, ...
What I have just described is not a practice of Roman times, but of today (it is part of biodynamics). It looks a lot like what were already considered superstitions two thousand years ago. Different strange ingredients are used, as the cow horns or deer bladders, for other preparations, buried on full moon nights, ... They are not even simple to prepare: luckily, you can comfortably purchase them, sold by companies ready to satisfy these modern needs of magic.

 

Gods of the vineyard

The ancient winegrowers also prayed gods to solve problems of fertility or various adversities, with rites and sacrifices.
About wine, everyone thinks essentially to Bacchus, a god originally linked to the force of nature and its cycles. However, he arrived in Rome only at the end of the third century. BC, from Greece and first passing through Etruria, inserting him in pre-existing cults. We know him well, so I won't go on. I report only what seemed to me a sort of winemaker's prayer, written by Virgil at the beginning of the second book of the Georgics:

 

[one_second][info_box title="Gods of the vineyard and the soil fertility" image="" animate=""]

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The viticulture in Rome was mainly protected by Jupiter, who had close ties to nature and, in particular, to the vineyard. In fact, the celebrations preceding the harvest were dedicated to him.

220px-Bona_Dea_Marble_Statue_with_Epigraph

A cult linked to the land is that of the triad Ceres, Liber and Libera. Libera was the Mother Goddess, later goddess of the fertility of the fields. Liber was her son-vegetation who dies and returns every year. In other versions, Liber and Libera were the two sons of the Mother Goddess Ceres, later goddess of fertility and crops. Later, Liber became the dominant figure, with the name of Liber Pater (Father), linked in particular to fertility. The tools of the harvest and the wine-cellar were consecrated to him and to Libera. He was later assimilated (in part) to Bacchus. I remember also the goddess Dia or Bona Dea, ancestral Mother Goddess, who remained as protector of the farmers and the female fertility. She was the wife of Faunus, god of the countryside, the pastures and the agriculture. The goddess Tellus presided over all the earth, from agricultural wealth to mining and to the dead.

Janus was a very ancient local God. According to Virgil (Aeneid), he was the king of the Aborigines, a primitive people inhabiting the mountains. He taught them the agriculture and the religion. Another myth describes him as the founder of one of the villages from which Rome was born, on the Janiculum hill. A myth tells that he hosted the god Saturn, when he had been expelled by Jupiter. His arrival marked the beginning of the Golden Age, an era of great agricultural abundance. In return, Janus received the power to see the past and the future, becoming the Two-faced God, symbol of the beginning and the end of the year. Another myth tells that it was Saturn who gave the wine to the King Janus.

Saturno_g

There is an even more ancient and local tradition of Saturn, told by Cato, in which he is described as a god winemaker who came down from the Sabine mountains. His wife is Opi, the Sabine Mother Goddess, who later became goddess of agricultural abundance in Rome. He tought the domestication of useful plants, the teaching of the art of grafting, of the cultivation of vines and of the beekeeping. He was always represented with a sickle in his hand, the tool symbol of the winegrower. People had to offered him some spelled soaked in lard and wine. Other very ancient and local gods were the couple Robigus and Robiga, the wheat protectors from the stem rust (a disease caused by a fungus), also invoked to protect the vineyard from diseases resulting from humidity and rain.

In the subjugated territories, the local deities remained as the main reference, such as the Mother Goddess Feronia, protector of agriculture among several peoples of the central Italy (Volsci, Latins, Marsi, Umbri and Etruscans). Helvius was the god of the Samnites who favored the fruit picking and the harvest, ... Among the Greek divinities assimilated, I also remember Priapus, depicted with a huge phallus, an expression of male sexuality, the human fertility and the vegetation one. His cult in Italy was mainly linked to the protection of vegetable gardens, vineyards and gardens from thieves (humans, but also birds or other animals). The god's effigy was placed at their entrance. [/info_box][/one_second]

"Here, O Bacchus Father, here all is filled with your gifts, the vineyard flourishes filled with autumnal vine shoots, the grape harvest foams in the brimming vats;

here, O Bacchus Father, come, and, free of footwear plunge naked feet, with me, in the new vintage."

Estatua_de_Dionisio_2

HUC, PATER O LENAEE*, TUIS HIC OMNIA PLENA
MUNERIBUS, TIBI PAMPINEO GRAVIDUS AUTUMNO
FLORET AGER, SPUMAT PLENIS VINDEMIA LABRIS;
HUC, PATER O LENAEE, VENI, NUDATAQUE MUSTO
TINGUE NOVO MECUM DERPTIS CRURA COTHURNIS...

*Lenaeus is one of the several names Bacchus.

 

In reality, there were numerous divine figures which a Roman winemaker could have prayed. The Roman gods linked to the land, the soil fertility and the agriculture were very numerous, with overlaps and connections often difficult to understand for us. Originally, Roman religion worshiped numen / (plural) numina, who were not personification, but acts of the divine power, expressions of the multiple aspects of each natural phenomena. The influence of other cultures (Etruscan, Greek, etc.) brought the Roman to give them ever more human form, stories and hierarchies, more or less from the late Republic. However, the original cultural imprint remained. This explains the absolute tolerance and assimilation of the Romans towards the divinities of other peoples. The only limitation was that the new cult did not create social or political dangers. However, with the laic lucidity of many great Roman authors, Varro wrote that originally what was useful was worshiped.

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In the countryside, the most loved and revered were often the local divine figures, even "minor" ones, but that the peasants felt closer to them. To the deities listed in the box, we add the Genius loci, the genius of the place, depicted as a snake or winged figure (of which I have told here) or the Nymphs, tied to sources or woods or certain places, ...

geniiFurthermore, every single agricultural practice had its tutelary deity, in an incredibly specific way. Servius lists some of them (Ad Georg., I, 21): Deus Vitisator (the god who presides over the vineyards planting), Vervactor (for the haymaking), Reparator (for the repairs, the arrangements of waterways and the fences, ...), Obarator (for the plowing) , Imporcitor (for the sowing), Insitor (for the grafting), Occator (for the harrowing), Sarritus (for the hoeing), Subruncinator (for the hoeing for the weeding), Messor (for the reaping), Convector (for the transport), Conditor (for the piling of hay, wheat or straw), Promitor (for the taking away from the stockpiles of hay, wheat or straw), etc.

The Christianity struggled much more to eradicate these local peasant cults, widespread in the countryside, than those of the main deities in the cities. It did it by simply carrying out a replacement operation: these figures became the patron saints or local cults of Madonna. In the same way, many ancient holidays related to the agricultural world have survived, absorbed by Christian holidays or became traditional agricultural fairs.
The Italian writer Carlo Levi, confined to Basilicata region by the fascist regime, was fascinated by the discovery of the existence of rural archaic cults and told it in his work "Christ stopped at Eboli" (1945). About the cult of a local Black Madonna, he wrote:

 

 

[blockquote author="" link="" target="_blank"]"The dark-faced Madonna, between the wheat and the animals, the gunshots and the trumpets, was not the pitiful Mother of God, but an underground divinity, black, of the shadows of the womb of the earth, a peasant Persephone, an infernal Goddess of the crops.

...

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The earth was too hard to work it, the olives began to dry out on thirsty trees; but the black-faced Madonna remained impassive, far from the pity, deaf to the prayers, indifferent nature. Yet the tributes are not lacking: but they are much more similar to the tribute due to the Power, than to that offered to Charity.

This black Madonna is like the Earth; she can do everything, to destroy and to flourish; but she doesn't know anyone, and she carries out the seasons according to her incomprehensible will.
The black Madonna is not neither good nor bad for the peasants; she is much more. She dries the crops and she let to die, but she also nourishes and protects; and you have to worship her.

In all the houses, at the head of the bed, attached to the wall with four nails, the Madonna of Viggiano attends to all the acts of the life,  with her big eyes without a gaze in the dark face."[/blockquote]

 

 

 

Bibliography:

"De re rustica", Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella (60-65 d.C.), tranlated by Giangirolamo Pagani, 1846 (I prefer the nineteenth century translations because, having a vineyard practices and wine production techniques more similar to the old ones respect ours, they know better explain the concepts and find the right words. The modern translaters often fall into error on the agricultural terms).

"Interventi di bonifica agraria nell'Italia romana", a cura d Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L'Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

"Storia dell'agricoltura italiana: l'età antica. Italia Romana" a cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002

“La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”, Luigi Manzi, 1883, .

“Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”, Dalmasso e Marescalchi, 1931-1933-1937, .

“Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”, Emilio Sereni, 1961, .

“Quando le cattedrali erano bianche”, Quaderni monotematici della rivista mantovagricoltura, il Grappello Ruberti nella storia della viticoltura mantovana, Attilio Scienza.

“Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell’Evo Antico”, M. R. Caroselli.

"Le tignole della vite", G. Anfora et al., Istituto Agrario di San Michele all'Adige, 2007.

http://narrabilando.blogspot.com/2014/05/culti-pagani-e-culti-cristiani.html


The vineyards of ancient Rome, between the owner's "otium" and the work of the winemaker

(continue from here)

According to Columella, those who want to start an agricultural business must not miss three things: knowledge, the will to do and money.

In fact, he says, the first two might be enough. However, he reminds us with subtle irony, that the possibility of spending is useful especially for those who lack skills, because in this way they can repair the mistakes they make.

Nothing could be truer!

[one_second][info_box title="The relaxing villa in the vineyards of Pliny the Younger" image="" animate=""]

Plinio_il_Giovane sulla facciata del Duomo di COmo
La statua di Plinio il Giovane sulla facciata del Duomo di Como

Pliny the Younger proudly recounts the splendid view on its large vineyards, which he can enjoy from his villa in the Upper Tiber Valley in a letter to his friend Lucius Domitius Apollinaris, known as the letter "of the villa in Tuscia".

Pliny was born in Como on 61 or 62 A.D. (death 113-114) and was nephew of the famous (and quoted by me several times) Pliny the Elder (uncle on the mother's side). He was a lawyer and a high state official. It had large properties in different parts of Italy but the most loved seems to be the estate of the Tiber valley in Etruria (called Tuscia by the Romans). It is located in present-day Umbria region, between San Giustino and Città di Castello.

They aren't the time of the 100 jugeri of Cato or the small (but wonderful) Palaemon's vineyard. We are talking about a large latifundium, which Pliny has inherited and, in a small part, personally enlarged. He owned land for an estimated total of about 10,000 hectares, scattered between a villa on the sea near Rome, one on the hills of Tuscia and two on Lake Como, plus a stately home in Rome and one in Como. The Tuscia property included eight thousand jugeri, about 2,000 hectares (1 jugerum is more or less ¼ hectare), with various crops, which gave him an income of 400,000 sexterti per year.

Evidently, he is not a winegrower. Pliny himself says that he loves this estate more than the others essentially because he considers it the most comfortable and most relaxing, far enough away from Rome to allow him perfect tranquility. Here he could dedicate himself in peace to his otium which, for the Roman intellectual of the time, was the time he could spend studying and reflecting, when he was free from the tasks of political and public life.

Pliny still represents the landowner who well manages his properties, not that who dedicates them above all to grazing, abandoning them to the degradation. He writes, with his traditional patrician mentality, that the only legitimate gain for him is that which comes from the land. In fact, he did not use his assets for other forms of investment. In his writings, he admits (honestly or not) that he does not feel rich. He says that his income is fluctuating (as normally happens in agriculture) and it is just enough to allow him to sustain the decorum required by his position as senator. His earnings allow him just a frugal life, he write, with the opportunity to indulge himself only occasionally some extra expense. However, he was careful also in these. Above all, he was a philanthropist: apart from the purchase of some statues and the construction of temples in his properties, he donated a plot of land to his ex-nanny and made several donations to his hometown, Como. He built there a public library, created a food bank for the poor giving some lands and, in his will, he bequeathed a thermal building.

Tuscum_des_Plinius_Schninkel_AA2
Reconstruction of Pliny's villa in Tuscia.

Returning to the letter and his estate in Tuscia, he describes the Apennine landscape with evident love. He tells of a large amphitheater with hills, and the mountains covered with woods. The cultivations extend both in the plains and on the hills, "rich in fertile land".

"At their feet and on each side, there are vineyards that draw a single plot far and wide; from their limit, almost from their margin at the bottom, the vines married to the trees begin". (Sub his per latus omne vineae porriguntur, unamque faciem longe lateque contexunt; quarum a fine imoque quasi margine arbusta nascuntur).

The first slopes of the hills are completely covered with vineyards, called vinea, the low vines. They completely surround Pliny's villa and, as he says, almost seem to enter the rooms. In the flat area, there are instead the long rows of the arbusta, the vines married to the trees, alternating with fields and meadows. Unfortunately, as you could read in other translations of this famous letter, those unfamiliar with Roman viticulture translate the word arbustum (pl. arbusta) with groves or even hedges (sic!). The married vine has been and still is often lost in translation, as I had already told here.

Pliny's description has been confirmed by the archaeological researches in the Tiber valley. The foothills areas had been chosen by the rich for their villas and were dominated by intensive vineyards, cultivated with slave labor. The plain was mainly managed by small farmers. They originally owned the plots, assigned them in the past with the centuriation. At Pliny's time, they had become renters of the landowners.

It seems that Pliny, like many other owners, sold the grapes on the plant to entrepreneurs who took care of the harvest, production and sale of wine. The wine of High Tiber Valley was sold above all in Rome city. It seems that, as frequently happened at the time, Pliny (or more easily his administrator) negotiated the grapes of the manor property but also of the rented winegrowers (coloni). It may seem normal in the event that they paid in kind, a share of grapes or wine (this contract was called colonia partiaria). The administrator was concerned with selling the renters' product portion also. The same happened even if the renter paid the rent in cash (rent contract called locatio-conductio). In this case, the landowner helped the settler to monetize his work, thus also ensuring himself also to be paid. The social relationship seems very equitable, far from the exploitation that the rented farmers will suffer in later periods or in other territories.

Digital Capture
This work by the Tuscan Antonio Tempesta (1599) shows us a campaign identical to that described by Pliny. In the foreground you can see the harvest from vines married to the trees (arbusta). Further back, around the rural building, there is the vinea, the low vineyard.

The difference between vinea and arbustum was not only social, shared between gentlemen and winegrowers. In another letter, Pliny stresses how important is the diversification in agriculture to be sure of having an income. It therefore emerges that the differentiation in vinea, arbusta and other crops was a thought-out strategy of the landowners, in order not to take too many economic risks.

coltivazione promiscua Umbria 1966
The promiscuous cultivationi of arbusta in Umbria region (1966, by Braconi)

The relationship between vinea and arbusta in Italy will undergo fluctuating oscillations in the centuries to come, without neither system ever disappearing completely (if not in our day). The little viticulture of the Medieval era, restricted around the villages and also brought within the walls of cities and castles, will see the vinea prevail, more suitable for small spaces. In later periods, especially from the XV-XVI century, with the possibility of returning to the open fields, there was the clear prevalence of the arbusta, the married vine, with the large extensions of promiscuous cultivations (as in the image). Finally, contemporary viticulture (from the mid-twentieth century), increasingly specialized and also mechanized, has led to the absolute affirmation of vinea and the definitive disappearance of the ancient culture of the arbusta, the vine married to the tree.[/info_box][/one_second]

The knowledge, therefore, for Columella is essential and is the reason why he felt the need to write his treatise, De Re rustica (60 or 65 AD). It is certainly the best source to understand the work of the vintner of the time. It is not a literary work, but a real technical treatise. It is so precise, detailed, with rational observations, to be considered the first agronomic text in history. It remained as a reference in Europe until the end of the eighteenth century. However, Columella represents the acme of knowledge of his time, a moment (like many in history) in which knowledge was not universally diffused.

falx vineatoria

A general and more practical aspect, which struck me when reading from Roman viticulture, is that at the time they had an incredible number of agricultural tools, with many specific functions. For the cutting work in the vineyard, there was a billhook with points, used only for this purpose, called vineatica or vineatoria falx, the symbol of the winegrower. It remained until recently in central and southern Italy, with the name of "pennato". Columella is recommended, for all cutting jobs, to always take great care not to injure the vine too much, to avoid diseases and pests, as we know today. The wounds, he advises, must be closed with tree resins or moist soil mixed with the oily deposit.

 

The vineyards

Columella lists the vine cultivation systems of his time. I have already mentioned some of them, but let's see them summarized here, as the Latin author describes them.

arbustum italicum
Arbustum italicum, nineteenth-century drawing

The married vine, i.e. the vine training system to a tree vine, in Latin arbustum, was the traditional Roman system and the most widespread, of which I have already widely spoken in many previous posts, describing its origin and peculiarities (here, here, and here). I quickly remember the descriptions given by Pliny and Columella (here you can try their origines). The arbustum is nomed Italian (arbustum italicum), because widespread in central Italy (at the time the only part of our peninsula that was called Italy): the vines (usually two) are climbing on a single tree. Columella explains that elm is the favorite because it grows well in many types of soil and its leaves are very suitable for foraging oxen. Poplar is not very useful for animals feeding but is used in some territories (such as Campania). According to Columella, the ash is better, used in steep and mountain soils that are not suitable for elm. Above all, its leaves are excellent for goats and sheep. Cato also mentiones the fig tree. In Etruria, the original homeland of the arbustum, we know that maple was mainly used and it continued in Roman period.

The second system is the Gallic system, called arbustum gallicum or rumpotinum, present mainly in Northern Italy, in which the vine branches (called traduces) passed from tree to tree. Not very leafy trees are used, including well-trimmed elm, maple, cornel, hornbeam and manna ash tree. Willow is used only in very humid soils. The shoots, if they cannot reach each other between tree and tree, are joined by a rod (horizontal poles). They can also be supported in the middle by vertical poles.

alberata da Angelo Sarti
Arbustum gallicum, still very spread in the Po Valley on the early twentieth century, photo by Angelo Sarti

These two systems remained in Italy until the mid-twentieth century.

Columella calls "yoked vines" all the types of cultivation in which the vine was supported, from the single pole to the more complex structures, made of poles, canes, ropes and pruned branches. The espalier system was called jugatio directa: all modern ones derive from it. Varro says it gives an excellent wine because the vines do not shade each other. There were also particular local systems, for exemple the Arpinate characata vine, where each branch was supported by one cane, in a circle system. The pergolas were called jugatio compluviata (from the name of the compluvi of the houses, in the drawing below).

2bis
Yoked vines, with poles and canes, not very different from those of the Roman era ("Harvest on the Palatine Hill", Rome, Bartolomeo Pinelli, 1840)

Columella says that, among the many forms of viticulture in the provinces (i.e. Sicily and other southern regions), he greatly appreciates the bush traning system, without support, which he calls "surrette" vines, (in Italian today is alberello). It also describes the creeping vine, that he calls "strata": it is a sapling with branches twisting on the ground. Columella says that it is used in extreme climates. The branches are superimposed on each other to prevent the grapes from touching the ground and rotting.

Since it was common to cultivate wheat or other crops among the vines rows, in general there was a tendency to leave spaces of two to twelve meters, to easily pass with the plow pulled by oxen. In the vineyards of the most inaccessible areas (mountains, etc.), the rows were tighter, up to a meter and a half, and jobs were done handly, with the hoe. Columella and Pliny both argue that the best plant system in the vineyards is the quincunx one, like the number 5 on a dice, useful for the sun exposure but also "because it offers a beautiful appearance" (Pliny).

compluviata
pergolato romano

The animals were considered one of the greatest dangers of the vineyards, especially the wild ones or the flocks that had escaped control. The low vineyards were always fenced, especially with hedges. Those trained to trees could be left open, with the possibility of using them for grazing, unless there were other crops to protect in the middle. The oxen which pulled the plow or the cart had muzzles, otherwise they would have eaten the shoots and the tender leaves of the vine.

aad3

 

Vine propagation and implantation

A very long and detailed part of Columella's treatise is devoted to the propagation of the vine, that is, the careful selection, creation and management of the cutting. The cutting was called malleolus (remained in Italian of more recent times as "magliuolo"), the little vine born from seed is the viviradicem. The Romans didn't used grafted vines, as we have to do today because of phylloxera (it will arrive in Europe only in the Nineenteenth century).

ciconia
They were so precise that, to check that the dig furrows were well done and regular, they used a measuring instrument called ciconia, a kind of straight edge. On the right, there is that common one, on the left the one devised by Columella, for even greater precision, equipped with plumb line.

The trenching of the vineyards was done in different ways. The pastinatio, testified by the written sources, consisted of hoeing the whole surface, at about 60-90 cm of depth. Other systems instead provided only for the excavation of long strips of soil, where the vines were implanted. Depending on the type of soil, they could do dimples, called sulci, or deeper trenches, called scrobes. In some archaeological sites, in shallow volcanic soils, traces of these excavations have been found still today, because, the ancient workers had to affect the underlying tuff layer. These systems have remained in Italy until recent times, until the spread of mechanical means.

pastinum

Different types of canals were also made in the vineyard, some for draining water from the more stagnant soils, others for irrigation in the drier soils.

At the bottom of the planting hole, they placed stones, marc mixed with manure, both as fertilizer and to "warm up" the cuttings. Then, they filled the holes with earth. If the soil was very poor, it was recommended to add fertile earth to the pit.

The cuttings were planted on both sides of the pits, so that they came out on opposite sides. To plant the young vines, they used the pastinum, a long stick that ended with two prongs. In more recent centuries it will be called auger (trivella) in Lazio and gruccia in Tuscany. We still use it today.

The young vines were tied to a cane so that they could grow straight, to then lead them to the form of training, as we do today. Especially in the first year, the Latin authors recommend to take care of the young vineyard, irrigating if needed.

 

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Michele Scienza with our gruccia (the Roman pastinum).
Pruning

Pliny tells that the vine pruning started at the time of King Numa. It seems that at the beginning the vintners refused to climb the trees (the vine training system to a tree, the original Roman form), which often were very tall, for fear of falling ("pericula arbusti"). Then, the practice of guaranteeing workers of the vines also the coverage of funeral expenses was introduced.

Several centuries after Numa, Columella writes, in a very modern way, that pruning must be done with three purposes: thinking about the production of the fruit, choosing the best shoots, studying to make the vine long-lived. For optimal pruning, he writes, the winegrower must remember the production of the previous year of each plant. He distinguishes and explains the long and short pruning, for each different vine training system. The creeping vine, instead, has only a very short pruning. He calls the spur (the part that remains of the branch after the short pruning) custodem, but he says that it is also called resecem or praesidiarium.

POT

Columella says that pruning can be done in October, after the leaves have fallen, when the shoots are ready. If the winter is too cold, however, it is better to wait after mid-February. It is correct, because some varieties bear the winter frosts badly, if they have already been pruned. However, he writes that the early pruning gives more wood, the later one more grapes. Today we know that the time of pruning affects above all the spring budding time of the vine. The too early pruning makes the vine sprout early, exposing it more to the risk of the late frost. (... continued...)

 

 

Bibliography:

"De re rustica", Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella (60-65 d.C.), tradotto da Giangirolamo Pagani, 1846 (preferisco le traduzioni dell'Ottocento perchè, avendo una viticoltura e tecniche di produzione del vino più simili a quelle antiche delle nostre, sanno spiegare meglio i concetti e trovare le parole giuste).

"Interventi di bonifica agraria nell'Italia romana", a cura d Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L'Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

"Storia dell'agricoltura italiana: l'età antica. Italia Romana" a cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002

"Le proprietà di Plinio il Giovane", V. A. Siragola, 1957

"Territorio e paesaggio dell'Alta Valle del Tevere in età Romana", Paolo Braconi, 2008, in F. Coarelli - H. Patterson (eds.) Mercator placidissimus. The Tiber Valley in Antiquity. New research in the upper and middle river valley, Atti del Convegno, Roma, British School at Rome, 27-28 febbraio 2004, Roma 2008, pp. 87-104

"La villa di Plinio il Giovane a San Giustino", Paolo Braconi, 2008, in F. Coarelli - H. Patterson (eds.) Mercator placidissimus. The Tiber Valley in Antiquity. New research in the upper and middle river valley, Atti del Convegno, Roma, British School at Rome, 27-28 febbraio 2004, Roma 2008, pp. 105-121

"La villa di Plinio il Giovane in Etruria, Giovanni Caselli,

“La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”, Luigi Manzi, 1883, .

“Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”, Dalmasso e Marescalchi, 1931-1933-1937, .

“Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”, Emilio Sereni, 1961, .

“In vineis arbustisque. Il concetto di vigneto in età romana”, Paolo Braconi, Archeologia delle vite e del vino in Etruria" A. Ciacci - P. Rendini - F. Zifferero (eds.), Archeologia della vite e del vino in Etruria (Atti Scansano 9-10 settembre 2005), Siena 2012, pagg. 291-306.

“Catone e la viticoltura intensiva”, Paolo Braconi.

“Quando le cattedrali erano bianche”, Quaderni monotematici della rivista mantovagricoltura, il Grappello Ruberti nella storia della viticoltura mantovana, Attilio Scienza.

“Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell’Evo Antico”, M. R. Caroselli.


The wonderful Palaemon’s vineyard and other vintners’ stories at the ancient Rome times

In ancient Rome times, the production of wine was considered an interesting business. Cato puts viticulture in first place in agriculture, as the most profitable activity and so it will be for centuries. However, it wasn't just an economic question.

The agriculture, especially viticulture, was considered the closest activity to the founding values of the fathers, to the saving bond with the land and nature, the ideal lifestyle, an occupation capable of elevating man morally to contrary to the vice and corruption of the city life, ... This "nobility" was also a matter of class. In fact, the patricians were the landowners par excellence, so they willingly praised and exalted their peculiar activity, while it was a goal of social affirmation for others. According to Cicero (De Officiis), "among the occupations in which the profit is assured, none is better than agriculture, neither more profitable, nor more pleasant, nor more suited to the free man". Yet, his job was another. The viticulture for him was the ideal activity for the old age.

There was a good dose of idealization of agricultural life in all these definitions, especially by those who (poets, writers or wealthy owners) had never really dealt with the hard life of the fields, dominated by the uncertainty of the year. Precisely in this period the agricultural world entered Arcadia thanks to Virgil, who first thus defined a literary topic of great success in the centuries to come. The Arcadia of Virgilio is no longer just the natural landscape but also the agricultural one, where benign Nature abundantly gives its fruits to the man skilled in his work.

We, however, are not literatus but vintners. Who works the land can love it without myths or bucolic visions, well knowing even the most difficult aspects. Certainly, the Roman farmers did not ignore them, as Cicero on the other hand, who clearly describes the risks and inconveniences of agricultural work in one of his famous orations (Ad Verrem).

Let's now understand the real life of the winegrower of the time, of which I will tell in this and other posts to follow. I begin by remembering a little Roman agricultural history, then going to see who our colleagues of the time were and then how they worked. Much has changed since then, yet something is similar to our present.

 

[one_second][info_box title="The wonderful Palaemon’s vineyard

" image="" animate=""]

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A vivid example of the viticulture of the time is provided by Pliny the Elder, who tells of a wonderful vineyard and brings it as an example of the great value of this activity.

It was owned by a grammarian (= high school teacher) very famous at the time, Quintus Remmius Palaemon. He was a freedman originally from Vicenza, an ex-slave who not only freed himself, but became very rich and famous. He is remembered for his contribution to the Latin language, for having introduced the study of Virgil's works in schools, but also for his vices and arrogance.

Remmius Palaemon, Quintus

In the period of Nero (55 or 57 AD), Palaemon purchased an uncultivated land in the Ager Nomentanus, at ten miles outside Rome, of just under 60 jugeri (about 15 hectares). The area was considered among the most renowned for wine, after the Falerno area. Pliny says that Palaemon had bought that land for little money, even if he had invested a lot for the vineyard planting, which was a very expensive operation today as at the times. In total, he had spent six hundred thousand sestertii.

He had given the contract for the works (the trenching, the plantation of the vineyard and then also its management) to his neighbor winegrower, Acilius Sthenelo, also a freedman. Pliny let us know that he was a vintner of proven ability and that it was he who had advised Palaemon on this whole affair. The contractor, then called conductor, is a farmer who, in addition to his own fields and vineyards, also works for others, thanks to his professionalism, manpower and tools.

Palaemon outsourced the bulk of the work and sold the grapes on the plant. Clearly the grammarian was an entrepreneur who wanted to make the most of his vineyard with minimal expenses. Pliny himself points out that Palaemon had not been driven by the love of viticulture in all this, but by his enormous and well-known vanity. Is Pliny pungent for class snobbery? In Rome, a slave could also ascend socially but he carried the mark of his origins all his life. However, at the times as now, it is certainly a boast to have the vineyard among the rich and powerful!

Pliny writes that, in the eighth year (the year of entry into full production for a vine trained to a tree, i.e. the ancient Roman viticulture form), the grammarian gained 400,000 sesterces from the sale of the grapes, 2/3 of the whole cost of the vineyard. According to Pliny, it is a very important profit. He compares it to the profits from the trade with the Indies.

Suetonius also tells of the wonderful vineyard (in his work De Grammaticis et rhetoribus). He claims that one of these vines can produce 360 bunches! This disproportionate number is perhaps a hyperbole to highlight the excellence of the vineyard (Suetonius was certainly not an agronomist). However, the traditional Roman vine training system, the "married vine" to a tree (arbustum) can truly give a very high production.

In any case, the vineyard had become very famous. In its tenth year, Seneca wanted to buy it at all costs, even if he had to stoop to do business with a man he despised. Pliny informs us that Seneca bought it for a price that was four times that initially paid by Palaemon, two million four hundred thousand sestertii, thus concluding his demonstration of the great economic value of viticulture.

Seneca obviously bought it only for prestige reasons, certainly not to make a profitable investment. Even today it happens that a wealthy person buys a very famous vineyard or winery at a very high price.

Seneca did not continue with the sale of the grapes, but produced the wine. Who knows if it was this activity that inspired him those paragraphs in which wine or vineyard become metaphors of human existence, such as:

"I advise you (Lucilius), however, to keep what (the time) is really yours; and you cannot begin too early. For, as our ancestors believed, it is too late to spare when you reach the dregs of the cask. Of that which remains at the bottom, the amount is slight, and the quality is vile.."[/info_box][/one_second]

A people of farmers.

Rome, like any civilization, was born on agriculture which, initially, was only subsistence. Varro says that, at the beginning, Romulus assigned each citizen a plot of arable land equal to two jugeri (roughly half a hectare), the bare minimum needed to live. According to tradition, the class of patricians descended from these first inhabitants - owners of Rome. In fact, the ideal image of the ancient Roman citizen was that of the farmer, who leaves the plow or the vineyard only to hold the sword when the country calls. Cato reminds us that, to praise a man, it was used to say that he was "a good husband and a good farmer".

Design_for_a_Stained_Glass_Window_with_Terminus,_by_Hans_Holbein_the_Younger

In the most ancient period, Romans tried to maintain a certain balance in landed property: it was thought that the excessive enrichment of someone would destabilize the whole of society. However, it was necessary to contain human greed and Numa Pompilius, the great legislator, instituted the Terminalia feasts, a typically ancient mixture of law and religion. He ordered the Romans to delimit their fields with stones, that were consecrated to Jupiter Terminus, protector of every right and every commitment (Juppiter Terminus later became an independent divinity, the god Terminus). The boundaries were thus made sacred and inviolable. The transgression of boundaries was considered one of the worst crimes. The transgressor was considered "sacer", that can be translated as sacred but at the same time damned: a person who had carried out actions so terrible as to place himself outside the society, entering into an area of belonging to the gods. He wasn't prosecuted by law, but anyone could have killed him with impunity. Numa also introduced the measurement of properties during these festivals. If they exceeded 50 jugeri (about 13 hectares), the surplus was confiscated by the state. Tullus Hostilius began to grant these requisitioned lands to the paupers.

Cincinnato abbandona il suo aratro per essere eletto dittatore e combattere per Roma (Juan Antonio Ribera, 1806).
Cincinnatus leaves his plow to be elected dictator and fight for Rome (Juan Antonio Ribera, 1806).

Roman hagiographic history refers us to figures of extraordinary integrity about this Roman ideal of moderation, that is, of a life governed by temperance and sobriety. We remember for example the general Curius Dentatus who, in 285 BC, refused 50 jugeri in Magna Grecia that the Senate wanted to give him, to thank him for having defeat Pyrrhus. He said he didn't want to set a bad example. The most famous case is that of Cincinnatus who, to respond to the call of the state, left his field of 4 jugeri on the Vatican hill and returned to work it once he finished his political office, without having enlarged it (that is, without having been enriched). I also remember that the Senate had to admit among the public expenses the payment of the work of the fields of General Marcus Atilius Regolus, who had had to extend his stay in Africa but, without his work, the family risked starving to death.

These laudable examples were only exceptions. In fact, over time, imbalances became more and more accentuated, thanks also to more and more permissive laws on property.

When Rome began its first conquests, the lands of the defeaters were confiscated and annexed to the ager publicus, the state property. A part of them were sold to free citizens. The richest ones obtained not only the largest but also the best soils. A part of the lands was however given to those who could not afford to pay but, in return, had to return a part of the harvest each year. Then, the lots were also assigned to veterans of armies.

It is not easy to understand how we went from the subsistence agriculture to the birth of farms with economic purposes (villae). The era of Cato the Censor (around the middle of the second century BC) stands as a milestone in this sense, thanks to his testimony of the ongoing transformation. The first villae (farms) were medium-small and sadly we know that their growth was been mainly linked to the slave labor, the prisoners of war.

However, a period of great prosperity began for wine and its trade, as well as for Italian agriculture in general, which would remain very flourishing until the end of the Republic and the first Empire. From then on, however, a progressive decline began, for multiple reasons. The first was the birth and expansion of the latifundium (estate), as the most ancient Romans feared, which led to the loss of specialized agriculture and dependence on the import from the provinces. How did this come about? It is not easy to make a summary but I try to give an idea of the transformation of the Roman agriculture.

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The large estates predominated more and more due to the progressive disappearance of small properties. Why? Even in the most prosperous era, the small-medium farmer did not always have an easy life. Several authors testify to us how huge the costs of starting and running a farm were, especially for the vineyards, and how heavy the taxes were. If we also add the risk of bad vintages, the difficulties multiplied. The small owners were often forced into debt, with little or no protection, with often very high interests.

Gradually, the small properties decreased, due to the huge costs and the usurers’ loans, which had already been reported since the time of Cato. If farmers were unable to pay their debts monetarily, they had to go to work as servants in the fields and vineyards of their creditors, neglecting their own. This form of servitude was called nexus. Those who could not even manage this situation had to sell the property, thus contributing to the enlargement of those of the rich persons. Those who remained without land abandoned the countryside and crowded into the city, living on state charity. Those who accumulated too many debts without being able to pay were sentenced to slavery.

Thus, Varro writes: "... the pater familias (fathers) gradually entered the city walls, abandoned the sickle and the plow, and prefer to use their hands to applaud in the theater and circus rather than in the cultivation of the fields and of the vineyards. So, we pay those who bring us wheat from Africa and Sardinia and make the grape harvest on the islands of Kos and Chios ".

From the late Republic onwards, the political and social unease about the progressive disappearance of small and medium-sized properties is witnessed by numerous authors of the time, with complaints of the situation or the moral incitement to return to agriculture. There are those who compose poetic praises about agricultural life, those who exalt its economic value (especially of viticulture, such as Pliny with the story of Palaemon's vineyard). The intent is to push the Romans to return to dealing with agriculture, which is increasingly in dangerous decline.

In late republican and early imperial age, larger and larger estates arose. Cicero already denounced that, at his time, most of the agricultural lands were owned by only 2,000 families. Some politicians tried, weakly, to stem these phenomena. The emperor Nero did it brutally: he executed six landowners who, on their own, owned almost all the African lands.

 

il saltus compare sempre più anche in affreschi e opere dell'epoca (dalla villa di Adriano)
The landscape called saltus (in Hadrian's Villa, near Rome)

Not all medium or small farms disappeared during the empire. Several remained for a long time, some even until the end of the Roman era, especially in marginal territories, as I have already said for our area of Bolgheri (see here and here).

The large estates, however, came to occupy a large part of the Italian peninsula. They were so large that it was less and less convenient to invest in specialized agriculture, such as viticulture. Animal farming became prevalent because it was inexpensive and requiring little labor. Thus, abandoned and shapeless landscapes spread, called saltus, which also appear in the pictorial landscapes of the time.

Initially, the saltus expanded to the detriment of the natural landscape of forests, destroyed by fire or by usurping public lands. During the Empire it expanded above all at the expense of the agricultural landscape and became increasingly perfectly superimposable on large landed properties. Only here and there was it interrupted by small worked plots, for the use of guardians and shepherds or the new figure of the colonus (of which I will tell later).

Palladius, in the fourth century AD, denounced those rich who built huge villae and gardens, neglecting agriculture or transforming fertile fields into pastures. He wrote that strange animals are raised only to feed the luxury of a few (such as peacocks, pigeons, thrushes, quails, ...), while more and more hungry people flee desperately from the fields and pour into the city.

In the late Empire, the agriculture declined also due to excessive taxation, military despotism and anarchy. The barbarian invasions did the rest.

 

Our ancient colleagues.: the winegrowers

The agriculture of the origins, of subsistence, was managed by the owner and his family, such as Cincinnatus or Atilius Regolus described above. Over time, the villa was born, that is, the farm for profit. Cato is the first to describe it in his work De agri culture (160 BC). He wrote his work with the intention of providing practical advice to the (rich) farmers to grow their business, a sort of manual that proposes a managerial model to follow.

According to Cato, the vineyard is the most important and most profitable crop, so it must occupy an important part of the company. The ideal size for him is one hundred jugeri (just over 25 hectares). Only later will the large latifundium be born. However, we must not compare it to a vineyard of today with the same size, because Roman viticulture was always promiscuous. The vines rows were alternated with the cultivation of wheat or other cereals, as will remain common in Italy until the twentieth century (see the picture).

campagna umbra 1958
This photo of the 1958 Umbrian countryside gives us an idea of what the agricultural landscape of the period of ancient Rome was like. Little has changed. You can see the classic promiscuous cultivation, with rows of maple trees to which the vines are trained, alternating with strips of cereals or other crops. (from Bracali et al.)

Cato says that, for his ideal winery of 100 jugeri, it takes 16 people to work. To manage it there was the vilicus (the factor), which is responsible for the direction of all agricultural work and administration, assisted by his wife, the vilica.

Below them, there were 10 generic workers (operarii), plus four skilled. The latter included a bubulcus (the cowboy, guardian and driver of the oxen), a subulcum (the helper of the bubulcus) and an asinarius (who took care of the donkeys). To plow and tow the carts, it takes two oxen and three donkeys, two of which for the carts and one for the olive oil millstone, with the equipment. The last skilled worker was the salictarius. He was the one who took care of the willows, whose branches were of multiple utility: the thinner ones were used to tie vines and other plants. The thicker ones were used to make baskets, mats and more.

 

bassorilievo-romano

Were they free or slaves? We know that the Roman villae were based above all on slave labor, yet Cato always writes of operarii, workers, never servants or slaves. However, the farms grew and expanded with the labor od slaves, especially starting from the Samnite and Punic wars. For a long time, prisoners of war were the main workers in agriculture. After Cato times, the figure of the ergastularius, appaeared; he was the guardian of slaves and servants. He controlled them and locked them in the evening so that they could not escape. We can console us to think that, sometimes, Roman slaves were able to redeem themselves as freedmen and even make social ascents, such as Palaemon or Acilio Sthenelo. However, it was unlikely that they were the unfortunate workers of the countryside. It was much easier for those who lived in close contact with their masters, managing to win their affection or respect. For example, the young Palaemon, accompanying his mistress's son to school, had managed to demonstrate great intellectual gifts. The kind-hearted woman thus gave him the freedom and the opportunity to study.

In the large villas, sometimes rich until the squandering, the number of employees and their specialization increased exponentially. Here are some examples: vinitor (the winemaker, who took care of the vineyard in a specific way, in these large properties), putator (the pruning expert), frondator (who pruned the vines or other plants), fossor (the digger, this word was also used as a synonym of fool), pastinator (the worker who hoed the vineyard), vindemiator (the grape harvester), arator (the generic plower), germiniseca (the one who cut the small shoots in the gardens and in the vineyards), strictor (the olive picker from the branches), legulejus (the one who pick the olives fallen on the ground), saltuarius (the lumberjack), topiarii (the gardeners), mellarii (they dealt with bees and honey production ) and many others.

paleocristiana-mosaico-02

Columella even recommends that everyone, depending on the job, have certain physical characteristics. For example, the cowboy must have a big voice and body, the plower must be tall in stature, the vintner must have strong arms, the shepherd must be diligent and frugal, etc. However, it is a pleasure for us to discover that Columella stresses that slaves should be treated with familiarity and respect, even in their professional role. In fact, he writes that they must be consulted in the job choices. Unfortunately, it wasn't the norm.

Let's not forget also the free men, as mentioned above, who had to lend themselves to servile work (nexus) to pay their debts. There were also free and paid workers, prevalent in territories where different social relationships had been established. An example in this sense was our ancient northern Etruria, as I have already told here. Finally, the plots of a large estate could also be rented to free farmers, who cultivated it with their family and their slaves.

 

During the empire, the slave system went into crisis: there was no more expansion and the continuous supply of prisoners of war stopped. To deal with the shortage of manpower, the so-called colonus figure was born from the third century. A.D., a sort of preview of the medieval serfdom.

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The term colonus means always farmer in Latin, but in that period it began to take on a particular meaning. Officially he was not a slave but a renter, but he had a relationship that was of the exclusive benefit of the wealthy owners. He was bound to the plot assigned to him by the landlord, so he could not leave at his leisure. He owed give almost all the production to the owner, except for what was strictly necessary to live, as well as having to carry out corvees in the manor fields. The final mockery was that he also had to pay taxes.

They were coloni by birth, or ex-slaves, or small landowners who "preferred" to renounce their independence because they were oppressed by debt and tax. There were also those who become colonus by conviction, for various crimes such as tax evasion or bankruptcy. This condition could only end with the choice to enter the army or clergy or through the temporal extinction of the crime. In the Justinian period, it was practically impossible to free oneself: one could only get out of it by managing to buy the land or becoming a bishop (!). Someone naturally tried to run away, like slaves did, with the risk of being severely punished by the master, even with death. Those who managed to escape could only become outlaw in the woods or hide in the crowds of the cities, or they had to put themselves under the protection of another lord.

 

(... continued...)

 

[alert style="warning"]Roman units of measurement for agricultural areas:

Agricultural areas were mainly expressed with jugerum (plural: jugeri), about 2553 m2, more or less ¼ hectare (which, I remember, is 10,000 m2). The basic unit was the actus quadratus, half of the jugerum.[/alert]

 

Bibliography:

Interventi di bonifica agraria nell'Italia romana, a cura di Lorenzo Quilici e Stefania Quilici Gigli, ed. L'Erma di Bretchneider, 1995.

Storia dell'agricoltura italiana nell'età antica. Italia Romana. A cura di Gaetano Forni e Arnaldo Marcone, Edizioni Polistampa, 2002.

Luigi Manzi, 1883,  “La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”.

Dalmasso e Marescalchi, 1931-1933-1937, “Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”.

Emilio Sereni, 1961, “Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”.

Paolo Braconi, “Vinea nostra. La via romana alla viticoltura”.

Paolo Braconi, “Catone e la viticoltura intensiva”.

Paolo Braconi, “In vineis arbustisque. Il concetto di vigneto in epoca Romana.

Paolo Braconi, “L’albero della vite: riflessioni su un matrimonio interrotto”.

Attilio Scienza, “Quando le cattedrali erano bianche”, Quaderni monotematici della rivista mantovagricoltura, il Grappello Ruberti nella storia della viticoltura mantovana.

Attilio Scienza et al., Atti del Convegno “Origini della viticoltura”, 2010.

Cornelia Cogrossi, "Il vino nel «Corpus iuris» e nei glossatori". In: La civiltà del vino. Fonti, temi e produzioni vitivinicole dal Medioevo al Novecento. Atti del convegno (Monticelli Brusati, Antica Fratta, 5-6 ottobre 2001). Centro culturale artistico di Franciacorta e del Sebino, Brescia, pp. 499-531.

M. R. Caroselli, "Terra e produzione agraria in Italia nell'Evo Antico".

Jesper Carlsen, "Landuse in the Roman Empire", ed. L'Erma di Bretschneider, 1994.

 


What are we doing now in the vineyard: the topping

After the fruit set, this is the moment of the topping, that is, the cutting of the final parts of the growing shoots, the apex and the last leaves. It is an ancient traditional practice, recommended since the  Roman agronomist Columella. Today we know why. It is not a generalized practice, but it brings several advantages that I am now trying to explain to you.

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The topping is part of the large family of works called "green pruning", which modify the canopy of the plant. If done properly, they improve the production and the sustainability of the vineyard.

These practices are in general usefull to keep the canopy within certain growth limits, to avoid the risk of accidental breakage of the branches. They also serve to regulate the balance between vegetation and production. It is important that the vine has sufficient canopy, in relation to its environmental and production conditions, to accumulate sufficient energy in the form of sugars. However, it is not only a question of quantity: the sugars correct distribution between the various parts of the plant is also fundamental for an optimal ripening. Some practices of green pruning also affect these energy balances. However, the canopy must not even be too much big, for an optimal exposure at the sun of the leaves and the bunches (these, depending on the climatic conditions, sometimes is better a more exposure, sometimes they must more protected). Finally, the too overlapping vegetation creates unfavorable, humid micro-environments that favor different diseases. So certain green pruning jobs also serve to prevent pathogen infections.

 

Let's go into detail: why do we do the topping?

The most simple reason is to cut the very long vine shoots. The physiological implications are instead listed here, in a synthetic way:

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  1. The topping makes the vines more resistant to water stress: the apical leaves are the largest consumers of water. By removing them, the plant achieves a better balance for the available water resources.
  2. It contributes to the creation of more balanced wines: the cutting of the apices blocks the development in height and stimulates the lateral buds, which form the lateral shoots. This shifts the internal balance, lowers the general vigor and therefore leads to a slight decrease in the production of sugars, which, at the same time, are better conveyed towards the bunches.
  3. It improves the micro-climate of the canopy: the cut slightly lightens the canopy, with greater illumination and aeration of the underlying leaves and bunches, improving the general quality. Furthermore, the humid environmental micro-conditions which favor various diseases are avoided.
  4. It rejuvenates the canopy: at first it actually ages it, because it cuts the tips with young leaves. Later, during the maturation, the stimulation of the lateral shoots leads to the birth of many new young leaves, very efficient in photosynthesis. The leaves of the main shoot begin to age at this stage. The overall rejuvenation helps to support an optimal maturation, allowing the accumulation in the bunches of all those components that will give the wine richness and complexity.

Be careful, however: all the viticulture practices are optimal if well done. They can create problems if done wrong .

The topping is optimal at this stage, immediately after the fruit set. If done too early it blocks the growth of the shoots and limits the canopy. If done too late, its action on the delicate physiological vine balance can become more negative than positive, because it can cause a too strong decrease in the sugar content and weight of the grape. For example, in cooler climates, the late growth of the lateral shoots goes to compete too much with the ripening berries for the absorption of the energy resources of the plant, to the detriment of the latter. In warmer environments, on the other hand, late topping does not particularly stimulate the growth of the lateral shoots. The risk is taking away leaves without benefits, only getting to decrease the canopy.

How much to cut? It depends on situation, but usually it is short. Generally, too drastic cuts must be avoided: we are not pruning an ornamental hedge! As said, if the leaves are too few, we risk negative consequences. It has been calculated that the bunches need to have a sufficient number of leaves above them for optimal ripening (at least a dozen). The leaves above the cluster are those that provide the sugars for ripening. Those below send their sugars essentially to the branches and perennial organs (trunk, roots). If the vegetative luxuriance is too intense that it requires very important cuts, we must consider changing something else in the general management of the vineyard.

Although the attention I have explained is needed, topping is not a job that requires a great precision. For this reason, in a espalier system like ours, it can be done mechanically, also because it is very important to end it quickly, in the short time that follows the fruit set.


New vintage: Criseo Bolgheri Bianco (white) 2018

The wait was long but the new vintage of our Criseo Bolgheri DOC Bianco, 2018, has finally arrived.

There is always a bit of a wait, but this year has been longer than usual. Every year we finish it before the following year is released because it is a wine produced in small quantities. In fact, it comes from a single vineyard of only 0.7 hectares, Campo Bianco, located close to our ford (= Guado), before the forest begins.

The 2017 vintage had been particularly low: the drought had significantly reduced the production yields. Because of this and the more attention derived from the TreBicchieri Award of the Gambero Rosso, the 2017 vintage finished very quickly. If you are curious to taste it, there are only a few last Magnums.

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2018 was a very regular year, with characteristics of greater climatic freshness than 2017. Spring was very rainy and made it possible to recover the dryness of the previous year. Summer was instead, as normal, hot and dry, without particular excesses. Some short rains cooled the temperatures at the end of summer, without creating problems. This seasonal trend allowed a longer ripening than usual: we harvested the Campo Bianco vineyard on September 10th.

The harvest date varies with the vintages: in the hottest and driest it can be brought forward to the end of August or in the first days of September, in the cooler it can moved a little further. The important thing is to seize the perfect moment of synergic maturation of the vineyard, in which the perfect balance is found between the varieties present (mainly Vermentino, Fiano, Verdicchio, Manzoni Bianco, Petit Manseng). In this choice, the experience we have acquired in over twenty years is very important.

This wine is a field-blend. The grapes, which grew together in the Campo Bianco vineyard and were harvested together, are also co-fermented after the selection. The co-fermentation is a old traditional practice, capable of making them express a unique personality.

Its taste? It is full-bodied, soft but balanced by a great freshness. It also has an incredible aromatic complexity, with aromas that change constantly as the wine is oxygenated in the glass. Fragrances of grapefruit, tropical fruit, pastry, sage, white flowers, saffron, mineral notes, hydrocarbons are released. Over time the latter will prevail, because it is a white wine that can have a long aging, thanks to the fact that after fermentation has remained in steel on the lees for almost a year. Now, we propose it after another year in the bottle.

It is excellent now, but if you love whites with more evolved notes, such as Michele and me, you can safely keep it in the cellar (at low temperature and with a bottle lying down) for a few more months ... or a few years.

If you resist!


We are waiting for you

Our winery is open now, with special opening hours. The wine shop is open:

from Monday to Thursday 10.00-12.30 15.00-17.30

Friday 10.00-12.30 15.00-17.30

Saturday 10.00-13.00 15.00-18.00

 

Guided tours and tastings are by reservation only. Please, phone at 0039 0565 763238 or send a message to info@guadoalmelo.it

 


Spring in the vineyard: the works of this period

In this season the growth of the vine is very fast. There are so many jobs to do!

We are now finishing the green pruning works, that is, a set of different interventions that act on the green parts of the plant (leaves, shoots, branches, bunches), so called in contrast to the "dry" or winter one (which we did on the branches). We do these jobs all by hand, because we must carefully chosen how to do them for each individual vine. Let's see those of this period.

Desuckering is the elimination of shoots that arise from the rootstock of the vine, as well as those that arise from the latent buds, on the trunk or other woody branches. It is important to do this very early, before they develop too much. We also has done the thinning of the shoots on the canes of the year.

https://youtu.be/nNVu7MpobYk

 

All these green pruning jobs are very important to help the vine find the right balance. They allow to decrease the load of the plant, so that future bunches ripen as well as possible. They prepare also the future winter pruning, which will be easier. Furthermore, the leaf mass is made less dense, thus avoiding the creation of an humidity environment conducive to the development of mold or other diseases. Finally, they also prevent blossom dropping problems. In general, compared to the flowers produced by each vine, only 20-50% (depending on the variety) will be fertilized and will set, that is, it will form the fruit. There is a problem when the blossom dropping is higher than normal for the variety. It can depend on physiological imbalances, difficult climatic conditions, nutritional deficiencies, various diseases (virosis, downy mildew, powdery mildew, vine moth, ...).

The work we are doing now is the arrangement of the branches in a vertical position. In espalier systems like ours, this is done by lifting a pair of parallel wires. The effects are numerous: the branches do not invade the inter-row and we do not risk breaking them in the passageways with the tractor, they are better distributed and less bundled. The vertical position, as I already explained in the post on pruning, increases the physiological activity of the shoots.

palizzatura
This drawing (from the Vignetinox catalog) makes us understand the threads system that facilitates the arrangement of the branches in the vineyard. The wires highlighted in red in the drawing are mobile (up and down) and equipped with a spring system. In early spring they are down (dashed line in the drawing). When the branches of the vine grow and lengthen, they tend to fall sideways. Then, we rais the pair of wires at the two ends of the row, collecting and verticalizing all the canes with a single gesture. Of course, there may be some branches that escape and will be set individually.

 

 

In this period it is also very important to understand, as soon as possible, if there are nutritional deficiencies in the vine. However, a dedicated post will be needed on this complex argument.

Depending on the environmental conditions, we must also take action to avoid the problems caused by powdery mildew and downy mildew, according to the principles of integrated pest management (sustainable viticulture practices). In this spring 2020, at least for now, we are more at risk of powdery mildew than downy mildew, as is usual for the climatic conditions of our territory. Downy mildew is a problem in the most humid and rainy areas. As for the vine moth, we have already distributed traps and systems of sexual confusion (biological control) in the vineyard.


Make every day Earth Day

Today is Earth Day but we must remember it every day, with actions than with words. We, as winegrowers, know that if our work is not sustainable, it cannot have a future.

For this reason, we choose every day the current best practices of integrated sustainable viticulture, which garantee 0 residues in wine and the environment, as well as a rich biodiversity in the vineyard.

For this we have built an underground cellar, which "disappears" in the landscape, which allows us to save 70% of energy, with a rainwater recycling system that reduces consumption by 40% (for all internal uses for which no drinking water needed).

For this reason, in the cellar we work with craftsmanship, respectful of the grapes and the exaltation of our most precious heritage: our territory.

More info on our website www.guadoalmelo.it


Renewal of our vine and wine museum

This suspended time is ideal for arranging the winery, to be even more beautiful and welcoming for when you can come back to us. These signs had broken by the wind. I took the opportunity to renew them.

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Happy Easter

Dear friends, happy Easter to all!

We wish you the best, even if at this moment it is really difficult to find words of hope, with so many deaths and suffering people, struggling economy, politicians who give us only empty words, …

Yet, Albert Camus wrote that hope (alone) equals resignation. And to live is not to resign oneself.

As you, in general we always show our happy and optimistic face, but our work is already made of thorns and roses.

We work with nature, that can fill us with satisfaction and joy, but sometimes it gives us terrible blows: the drought, the frost, a bad year, ... Furthermore, we have to fight with a suffocating bureaucracy, the importer that suddenly leaves us, the tractor or the bottling machine that breaks suddenly (a tad more than petty cash!), ...

That's why we are used, as you, to being strong against the life's obstacles, to reinventing ourselves, to work as much, as and more than before. This virus is one of the worst blows for all of us, but it doesn't scare us: if it not will take down us, it will make us even stronger.

So, we wish you to have strength. Let's stand strong, for us and for our loved ones, for the less fortunate, for those who cannot really make it alone.

Everything will be fine, but only if we work hard for it.

... and don't forget to drink an excellent wine, the best remedy for the spirit!

Annalisa and Michele Scienza

photo: Katrin Pfeifer


Rute, new vintage 2017

I had to write the data sheet of the new vintage of our Rute Bolgheri Rosso, 2017. I thought about what Bolgheri is for us: it is our home simply. So, I looked for what we (Michele, me and our children) mostly love of our living here, and I described it like this, in few lines:

"Bolgheri was a very difficult, harsh,
and waste land for centuries.
Today it is a Mediterranean garden,
with a still somewhat wild beauty.

For us, it is our home,
which has the scent of the hill paths
in the scrub, of the salty sea smell
in the sand dunes,
which has the sound of the waves of the sea,
of the cackles of the boys
who are bathing in the ford*, …

Rute is this Bolgheri, familiar to us,
that we look for in the earth and
in the stones of our vineyards,
in our craftsmanship."

What do you say?
*Guado al Melo means “ford* at the apple tree”. There is really a ford near our vineyards, where our children and their friends have played.

 


Viticulture in Rome and the rediscovery of the Genius Loci

The Romans were great winegrowers. At the time of their agricultural acme, they had reached good empirical knowledge of the vineyard practices (with the due limits). Later, it will take centuries to recover these skills. Among these knowledge, the truly disruptive element of Roman viticulture, which will mark the Italian (and European in general) vine-wine culture up to the present day, was the understanding of the inseparable link between wine and territory.

Roman viticulture knowledges were built in centuries, from a primitive viticulture of the origins to what is considered the apex, the second part of the first century BC. In this period Columella lived, who is considered the first agronomist in history. His work "De Re Rustica" is so precise and detailed that it is considered the first real agricultural treatise ever. The agrarian authors after him will essentially resume its contents and not for a short time: Columella will remain as the main reference for agriculture at least until the end of the eighteenth century.

[one_third][info_box title="The choice of soil, climate and varieties according to the ancient Romans" image="" animate=""]Let's see what the agrarian Latin authors wrote about wine and territory, especially Columella.

Columella writes numerous reflections on the choice of the place of the vineyard, in relation to the soil and climate, and the consequent choice of the most suitable varieties. Not all of his considerations are correct, in light of our knowledge, although many are so (albeit generic). What is relevant is that the Romans understood the importance of these relationships more than two thousand years ago.

Columella writes that the best soil should not be too clayey and not too light (today we would say medium-textured), but get closer to the latter. It must not be too poor and not too fertile, but better similar to the second. The steep terrain is not the better, not even the extreme plain. The better is a more or less inclined plane (to drain the water). It is necessary to investigate the type of land, even underground, and not only look at the surface. The best choice, however, is to experiment with the different types of soil, to understand the different production responses.

In general, however, if the soil is suitable for giving pleasant and precious wine, it is better to plant varieties that are not too productive, but not too little either. If, on the other hand, the soil is not so good, it is better to plant a very fertile variety, to have a good yield in quantity.

Nel piano si ha vino più in abbondanza, nelle colline quello più gradevole. Le vigne inclinate verso il nord sono più fertili, ma quelle verso il sud danno il vino dal gusto migliore. Nei luoghi freddi è meglio avere l’esposizione a sud, in quelli tiepidi è meglio l’est, purché in entrambi i casi non siano esposti a venti provenienti da quelle direzioni.

 

We know the names of many Roman varieties, in fact they have been listed in several ancient texts. It is really impossible to connect them to modern ones. The names changed even at that times. Varieties that are listed by Cato are no longer named by Columella and Pliny, who write 200 years later. Even these two authors, who are contemporary, sometimes list different names. Anyway, I don't write the varieties, also because they can be found everywhere. It seems to me more interesting the part where Columella explains the choice of vines in relation to the territories.

He writes that, when you have to make a vineyard, you must be personally informed about the best vines to plant and do not entrust the purchase of the cuttings (viviradicem) to others. Better still is the internal nursery (vitiarium). It must not be placed in a soil of worse quality than that of the vineyard.

The farmer must understand that the varieties of vines that resist fog are suitable for the plains, instead those that tolerate drought and winds are more suitable for the hill. So, in the fertile soil, the not very vigorous vine will be planted, in the poor soil the most vigorous vine, in the dense soil the strong vine that produces many canes. The vines that produce large and soft berries are not suitable in moist soil. Those with small and hard grapes are better. Different varieties can grow in well-drained soil.

The winegrower, however, must not only to pay attention to the soil but also to the climate. Where there is colder and fog, the early vines are better, the fruits of which ripen earlier or those that have robust and hard grapes. Where there is a lot of wind and storm, robust vines with hard berries will also be planted here. Where it is very hot, the most tender varieties and that have the most compact bunches are the best. In the most placid and serene places, you can put all sorts of vines, but the early season ones are the better.

The wise winemaker in addition to the best vines, should always plant different varieties, because each can respond differently to the adversities of each vintage.

From Columella description, we can also understand that the common practice at the time was the field-blend vineyard, i.e. with multiple varieties mixed together, as remained in Italy (and other European territories) for centuries to come. According to Columella, however, it is better to arrange the varieties separately. He lists the advantages of this choice. Not all of them bloom and mature at the same time. It is not easy to collect together grapes with different maturity: if you wait for the later grapes, the first ones are eaten by birds and damaged by winds and rains. The separation also allows the vintner to know how to prune each of them, because at that time there isn't the leaves to make the typology understand. In addition, the winegrowers can choose to plant each species in the part of the vineyard best suited to its characteristics, for the soil or with the right exposure. However, Columella admits that it is often difficult to implement this principle, also because most of the winegrowers cannot distinguish the different varieties. However, if not possible otherwise, Columella writes that at the least it is better to plant together those varieties that have similar taste and similar maturity. We can find identical considerations to Columella's ones in numerous texts of the agronomists of the nineteenth century. As Columella, also they tried to ferry the viticulture of their times towards more rational forms!

The vineyard with more varieties is called by Plinius vitis conseminea, conseminales vinea by Columella.

 

[/info_box][/one_third]

santa costanza roma crisitanesimo-romano

In his and in other Latin texts, it is underlined and examined how each soil and climate require the choice of the most suitable grape varieties, the different choices of work approach and the production of different types of wine. This, linked to the fact that the Romans first identified wine with the place of origin and the year of production, makes us understand that they were the first to conceive that fundamental concept that we commonly call today "terroir".

The Romans had not given a name for this concept, just as it will not be done long in Italy and in the rest of Europe. Yet, it has been a tradition for millennia.

This concept was examined in depth in more recent times, within that long process of transformation of the twentieth century wine sector, that is the basis of the birth of modern wine. In particular, this argument was mostly discussed after the Second World War.

In this period many scholars and experts began to reflect deeply on the concept of wine and territory, as a basic element of wine European culture.

 

Its definition is not simple, as it is made up of many factors. The first, the most obvious one, is certainly the territorial one in the strict sense, linked to the geographical characteristic, therefore soil and climate. In relation to these pedo-climatic differences, there are also the different answers that each grape variety can give in a different territory or micro-territory. Furthermore, the annual variations of these elements, linked to the vintage, must be considered. However, not only the "natural" elements intervene. A territory is also linked to the local traditions, their transformations over time, the transformation of the landscape by the man, the history, the local wine culture, the production choices, etc.

The scholars understood necessary to find a name to express this so complex concept. The word "territory" is limiting, too common, and therefore possible cause of misunderstanding. The easiest mistake, which many persons still make today, is to reduce it to the pedo-climatic characteristics only. Thus, two terms were born: Genius Loci and terroir.

They are different? No, they express more or less the same concept, but they are born in two different cultural spheres.


The Genius Loci

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In modern times, the Latin locution Genius Loci was first introduced in architecture, inserted in the historical reflection on the concept of place. From here it was transferred to the concept of wine territory.

What does mean Genius Loci?

In ancient Roman times, the Genius (from the verb gignere = to create, to generate),  was a tutelary spirit, a benevolent god who watched over every person. More or less, the same concept was present in Greek culture, where it was called daimon. It was not only proper of the individual, but also of the community: there were also a Genius of the family, of the Province, of the State, of various associations, etc. The concept was also extended to places, with the name Genius Loci, the genius of the place (locus). It was a benevolent caretaker who watches over it and the people who lived there or even a sort of personification of the place. According to Servius:

"nullus locus sine Genio est" (no place is without a genius).

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Virgil, in the Aeneid, describes it (him or her, the Genius may be masculine or feminine) as a big and slimy snake that crawls out of the depths of the earth (book V, 84-75). It was often depicted as a snake, an animal considered a symbol of luck. Its image on the walls of a building was the expression of the desire to put it under the protection of the Genius Loci. Often it is depicted as a snake wrapping himself around an altar, where it goes up to devour the offerings that people have been made to him.

To have its benevolence, it is necessary to respect its place, to invoke its protection and to offer it perfumes, flowers, fruits, focaccias and wine. Then, the Genius would have been benevolent, it would have revealed himself/herself filling the place with sacredness and lucky. On the other hand, if the person had been hostile to the place, devastating it or exhausting its resources, then the genius would have been antagonized. It would have denied itself, it would have emptied the place of its presence, thus causing misfortune.

genii

Sometimes, the Genius is represented as a human figure, surrounded by symbols of plants and animals typical of the place. The more common picture of the Genius was a winged person, from which the depictions of the Christian angels are derived.

These beliefs will however be assimilated into Christianity in the figures of the Guardian Angels and Patron Saints.

 

The architects Aldo Rossi, in the late 1960s and, above all, the Norwegian Christian Norberg-Schulz, a decade later, were the first to introduce the figure of the Genius Loci in the modern debate on the meaning of "place". The Latin locution Genius Loci thus began to be used to define the complex multiplicity of those elements that constitute the deepest identity of a place. They include all its intrinsic characteristics, made up of geographical and structural, natural and artificial elements, but also by immaterial and changeable elements, such as historical and cultural stratifications, the very way in which the observer perceives it, its character, the colors, the variations of the light, etc.

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Few years later, prof. Attilio Scienza, taking inspiration from the architectural debate, proposed the use of the figure Genius Loci in the wine sector, to powerfully recall that link between wine, territory and culture, inherited from the Romans.

 

The birth of the "terroir"

At about the same time, this reflection was also maturing in France, starting from the same cultural background: all European wine territories are heirs of Roman viticulture.Winged_genius_Boscoreale_Louvre_P23

The French scholars made this concept explicit with the term terroir, which began to be used with this meaning more or less from the mid-1900s. Until then, this word was an archaic synonym of soil or territory, not commonly used in modern French. It was an archaism used mostly in agriculture. Oddly, in the XVIII-XIX century the word "terroir" has been derogatory. The "goût de terroir" (terroir aroma) indicated a negative aroma of the wine. "On dit que le vin a un goût de terroir, quand il a quelque qualité désagréable qui vient par la nature de la terre où la vigne est plantée". "It is said that the wine has the taste of the terroir when it has some unpleasant quality that comes from the type of land where the vine was planted". (Louis Liger, “Dictionnaire pratique du bon ménager de campagne et de ville”. Ribou, Paris, 2 t., 449 & 407 p.).

 

In the 70s-80s, prof. Attilio Scienza committed himself to spreading the concept of viticultural territory as Genius Loci, with a view to highlighting its productive and cultural importance, but also to underline our "birthright", as Italians, of a cultural heritage born in Italy, using a Latin name.

Hatzikyriakos-Ghika Nikos, Genii Loci, 1970
Hatzikyriakos-Ghika Nikos, Genii Loci, 1970

Unfortunately, the world of Italian wine did not understand the centrality of this aspect, as well as the great communication on Italian wine in the world that would have derived from it. Later, when Italian wine-producers began to understand the importance of narrating their traditional relationship between wine and territory, they had to accept the use of the French word “terroir”, which in the meantime had emerged in the world. In fact, our neighbors (unlike us) had understood the importance of this concept first. Then, the word "terroir" was amplified and consolidated universally by Anglo-Saxon wine writers. Today, sometimes, the French claim to have also invented it! Sic transit gloria mundi (as Latins said)

 

I can't hide being biased. My Latin soul makes me love the term Genius Loci more, also because it seems to me that it explores greater depths! It is so fascinating the image of a genius who gives us favors or misfortune as much as we love and respect our land!

However, beyond primogeniture and words, the fact remains that nothing like the concept of Genius Loci (or terroir) is able to represent the truest soul of artisan wine, from over two thousand years. There are people who say it is something impalpable, difficult to explain in detail or to understand rationally while tasting a wine. On the other hand, it is its nature: in part it is explained by science, but it also has something elusive, complex, easier to understand only with the intuitive side of the mind. Anyway, when I'm doing my work of winemaker, however, I always realize that nothing is more real and alive in our wines than it.

 

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The images without caption are mosaics and frescoes from the Roman era.

 

Bibliography:

Columella, “De re rustica” , 65 d.C.

Giangirolamo Pagani, 1794, Rustici Latini Volgarizzati, Lucio Giunio Moderato Columella, ed. Vittorio Curti Venezia.

Attilio Scienza et al., 2010, Atti del Convegno “Origini della viticoltura”.

Luigi Manzi, 1883,  “La viticoltura e l’enologia presso i Romani”.

Dalmasso e Marescalchi, 1931-1933-1937, “Storia della vite e del vino in Italia”.

Emilio Sereni, 1961, “Storia del paesaggio agrario italiano”,

Marcella Peticca, "Genius Loci: perdita e riscoperta del luogo", 2015, Università di Bologna.

P. Prévost, P. Morlon, J. Salette,  "Le Mots de l'Agronomie", 2017,  https://mots-agronomie.inra.fr/index.php/Terroir

https://www.romanoimpero.com

 

 


We are closed

As known, we are in an emergency Corona virus. So we adjust to the rules and we are closed. if you want our wines, we ship them your home. Write me at info@guadoalmelo.it for info.

We are closed at least until April 3 (inclusive), then we'll see.

 


The vineyard balance always stars with a good pruning

In these days we are doing the winter pruning in the vineyard, which is the most important of all the works to direct the vines to a harmonious balance. I will try to make you understand broadly how and why we do this work.

First of all, I would like to emphasize that nothing must be improvised in the winegrower's work: we rely on a thousand-years peasant knowledge, then deepened by the studies on the physiology of the vine and its relations with the environment around it. Only a good knowledge allows to respect its balance and intervene in a respectful but useful way.

It is important not to make mistakes in the pruning, otherwise we will not be able to produce great terroir-expressive wines. Making a mistake (or making a bad pruning due to lack of skill or lack of competence) has the result of limiting the expression of the full potential of the vineyard and / or damaging it to such an extent as to shorten its life.

 

[one_third][info_box title="What happens if the vine is not pruned??" image="" animate=""]009

If you do not prune, as happens to wild vines in nature or as it was done in the forms of primitive viticulture, the plant tends to grow a lot and produce many bunches. They are small, not very sweet and not very balanced. It is a grape that is good for feeding wild animals or for making a rudimentary wine.

However, the first winegrowers began to understand with the experience that, by pruning, they managed to produce a better, sweeter grape, and they were able to produce a much more interesting wine. From then on, this practice was no longer abandoned but refined, to the point of becoming almost an art.

The unpruned vine also has a significant production alternation. It means that a year there is an abundant production, the following year instead there will be very little grapes or practically nothing, and so on (beyond the normal fluctuations of the year production, linked to the seasonal trend).[/info_box][/one_third] In practice, when the vine is on dormancy, we cut the branches of the past year, leaving a certain number of buds. This number is carefully evaluated, because it determines the production of the following year. The number and distribution of the buds also define the living space of the plant, that is what is called the vine training system. It is important because it determines the balance between all the parts of the vine (trunk, roots and canopy), in relation to the environment in which it lives.

The cut should be evaluated vine by vine, vineyard by vineyard. It can only be done by hand, by expert people. No choice is random in the good management of the winegrower: if you have the patience to go through with this post, you will understand it.

However, it is not the only work that acts on the overall balance. So, it must be done with an overview, starting with the birth of the vineyard itself, its story over time and already thinking about the subsequent works. Everything must be integrated in the vineyard management.

When pruning:

Pruning is done when the vine is in the winter dormancy phase.

The time of pruning affects that of the spring budding. The sooner you prune and the sooner the vine will sprout (and vice versa). Generally, we winegrowers want to prevent an earlier budding, because there is often a great risk of bad weather at the beginning of spring. There could be frost or hailstorm, which could damage the shoots. For this reason, generally, we prune as far forward as possible. However, it depends a lot on climate: the risk is maximum in northern Italy, minimum in the south (with all the possible intermediate variables). The big risk for our territory is the frost due by the north or north-east winds.

It must also be taken into account, especially for those who are in colder climates, that some varieties bear winter frost less well if they have already been pruned. In this case, it would be better to wait until the coldest period has passed.

Finally, the winemakers have to deal with their own forces and the size of their vineyards, to calculate the exact times. Pruning must be finished, in any case, before the "vine weeping", i.e. the emergence of droplets from the cutting points of the wood. It is the signal of the restart of the sap circulation in the plant, the first sign of the forthcoming development of the shoots.

 

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The tools of the pruner.

In the past, the winegrowers used different cutting tools for each region of Italy. The billhook was mainly used in the north. In the center and in the south, different shapes of "pennato" were prevalent (in the drawing: it is similar to a billhook, but with the addition of a second blade. This pruning knife shape dates back to the Roman period). These tools were difficult to wield: it was easy to injury yourself, to injure the plant too much (with the entry of diseases and pests) and it takes strength. In the nineteenth century, the pruning shears (or secateurs) began to be used and the work started to be a little easier. Today we still use them, sometimes electric or pneumatic ones, to reduce fatigue and hand usury. The saw is used only for cuts of particularly large branches, or parts of the trunk.

 

forbici a molla

Pre-pruning is often done for sustainability reasons (as we also do it). It is a very coarse cut of the branches, made with the pre-pruned machine. Then, the pruners will make the handcrafting precise cut. Pre-pruning eliminates the waste of time and the effort to untangle the long branches, wrapped around the wires and between them. Speed is important because, as written, the working time frame is often not very wide.

 

What do we do with the canes?

As tradition, we break up the branches cut in the vineyard and use them to make compost, useful for recovering organic substance. Someone burn them, but it is not environmentally friendly and it is also a waste. The vegetable compost, which we also do with all the other plant remains (stalks, grass, etc.), contributes to enriching the soil above all with nitrogen, calcium and potassium. The high biodiversity index of our vineyards favors the mineralization of the organic substance and the correct distribution of these nutrients.

 

Let's go into detail:
A very delicate and complicated balance

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The vine directs its energy to different purposes: the growth of all its parts (woody and green), the formation and development of the bunches, the accumulation of sugars and other organic compounds in the grapes, the storage of reserve substances. All these functions are fundamental for an optimal vine balance (and the vineyard as a whole) so that it grows well, gives good grape and has a long life.

Pruning (with other subsequent works) acts on the regulation of the vigor of the vine, directing its energy first of all to the production of balanced grapes, but it is always necessary preserving a harmonious development of the plant.

The pruning is heavily conditioned by the territory (climate and soil), variety, rootstock, etc. A well-knowledge of these all elements are indispensable to do the optimal choices. Depending on the different conditions, it may sometimes be necessary to stimulate the vigor of the plant, sometimes it is better to limit it.

A too vigorous vine tends to grow a lot in all its parts, producing a lot of grapes, but they will be low-quality. Even a too weak vine will not produce the best wine it could express. It lacks energy and cannot accumulate all the necessary organic compounds in the bunches. Furthermore, it would not feel good in general: it would not be able to carry out the vegetative renewal, to deposit the reserve substances in the perennial organs. This would compromise the balance of the plant, including the optimal work of the roots, with important repercussions on the present and future life of the vine.

In both cases, there would be produced poor quality grapes (for opposite reasons), which will ripen badly. It is not just an unbalanced accumulation of sugars (too many or too few). It will also be a grape that will produce a wine with an unbalanced acidity, which could maintain herbaceous characters, which would not be able to develop aromatic complexity, etc.

[info_box title="Life cycle and buds" image="" animate=""]The vine life is a circle: it sleeps in winter, wakes up in spring, sprouts, grows, bears fruit and goes back to sleep. However, it is not a closed cycle: each year it is closely connected to the previous one. The buds that will sprout next spring were formed the year before. They are called dormant or latent buds.

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The dormant buds wake up in the spring, sprout and form new canes. Leaves, clusters, tendrils and new buds are born on the internodes of the canes. There are two kinds of buds: the latent and the lateral one. The latter is active in the same vintage in which they are born: it will develop the lateral shoot, during the spring and summer. For now, however, it doesn't interest us.

If we slice a dormant bud in its birth year and look at it under a microscope, we see that inside there is the primordia of the future cane, on which there are the primordia of the future bunches. Their number indicates the fertility of the bud.

So, do you understand why the more or less good performance of the previous year also affects the production of the next one? Fertility depends on many factors, such as the variety, the vigor of the plant or of the single cane (it grows with the growth of vigor but the two extremes instead, too much or too low, both reduce fertility), etc.

From this microscopic observation, we can also see that there is not only one future cane in the bud. In the center there is one, the largest, called primary bud. There are two other (or one) smaller ones nearby. They are called secondary buds. They are reserves: if the primary bud dies, the secondary ones develop, which are generally not much fertile.

Not all dormant buds, left with pruning, will develop. Some die. Others can remain latent. They are incorporated in the growing wood and can develop even after several years. These secret survival reserves are awakened by particular events, difficult for the vine life (blows, frost, drastic pruning, etc.). When they wake up, they form low, sterile branches, called suckers. In general, the vintners eliminate them with the green pruning. Sometimes they come in handy, because these low canes can be used to reform structural parts of a plant that have been damaged by trauma or pests.[/info_box]

The number of the buds

The number of the buds per vine changes the flow of vigor of the plant.

How many buds to leave with pruning depends on many factors. In general, too high a number of buds would cause an excess of grapes produced. Too low would induce too vigorous growth of the green parts, subtracting energy from the ripening of the bunches. However, it depends a lot on each particular situation: variety, rootstock, climate, soil, density of the vines, previous production, etc.

The best way to understand the optimal number depends only by experience and knowledge. It is necessary to live your own vineyard, make small tests and accurate observations, carried out over the years, which make us understand if we are working well or not.

The vine balance must be as continuous as possible. Excessively drastic changes, even if corrective, can sometimes be more harmful than useful. They alter too sharply a now set balance. For this reason, it is important to evaluate certain changes in an integrated way, considering all the year works in the vineyard.

Short or long pruning?

Another key element of pruning is whether it is done in a long or short way. This depends on the fact that the buds do not always have the same fertility along the cane. It has been known since Roman period, as wrote by Columella. It depends on the climate but also on the varieties.

Why the climate?

POT

In colder climates, the buds on the first internodes are not complete. They do not form the primordia of the bunches (in scientific terms, they do not well differentiate). They will therefore be little (or not at all) fertile. This happens because they are the first to develop, in early spring. In these climates, this is an unfavorable moment: there are difficult environmental conditions and the plant is weak. The same happens in summer, for the buds of the last internodes. The most fruitful are those that arise in the best moment of life of the plant. They are located in the intermediate part of the cane.

In the warmer territories, as in our case, this usually does not happen. The climate is good from the start, so the buds of the first internodes are also fertile. In this case, it is always better to prune short. A long pruning leave too many fertile buds and too much production would occur.

Some varieties behave differently, regardless of the climate.

Where possible, the winegrowers usually prefer short pruning, which generally gives a better balance between leaves and bunches, with better ripening. In this case, cutting the cane, a short stump remains, called spur.

Long pruning is instead done more frequently in the north Italy, in cooler climates, or it is necessary for some varieties. When we cut, a longer piece of cane remains, with more internodes.

There is also mixed pruning system. In this case, we cut some short and other long canes. It is necessary for certain forms of grapevine training system, when we need to have fruiting branches and to renew the woody parts.

I continue to write "in general" because these aspects are very variable and only experience and knowledge of one's situation lead to the best choice.

 

Grapevine training system.

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So far, I have described the production pruning. It changes also according to the form of vine growing.

In the first years of life of a vineyard, pruning does not have productive purposes but serves to make the small vine grow well and to take it to the shape of the chosen training system.

How do you choose the training system? It depends on the territory (over all, the climate) and the varieties. In Italy there are many traditional training systems. Each choice is not accidental.

A substantial difference is the height of the trunk of the vine. This element greatly changes the balance of the plant. Inside the trunk, there are vases that carry what is absorbed by the roots (water and mineral salts) and, vice versa, what produced by the leaves (organic substances and energy). The longer the trunk, more energy is lost only for these transfers, subtracting it from the rest. However, there are also different needs, which can make more or less useful to have the trunk higher or lower. For example, where the vigor is not a problem, but there are risks of humidity and frost, it may be more useful to have the trunk high, to distance the bunches from the ground.

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The training system and pruning also affect the arrangement of the canopy. If you notice, there are vineyards with vertical canes, in others they are more or less inclined. Sometimes, they are drooping. This orientation is not accidental. The vegetation activity, the vigor of a cane, is favored by the vertical position. This is generally preferred where there are limiting environmental conditions for the vine. The more the branch is bent with respect to the vertical, the more it loses its vigor. So, it is often found in the territories where you want to counteract too high a vigor. It is a phenomenon that also depends on the complex internal transport of the plant.

There are also training systems where the branches are more or less bundled together, willing to make circles, pergolas, etc. In general, the canes that are too united and overlapped favor the stagnation of humidity, the diseases, limit the absorption of sunlight by the leaves, etc. All these choices depend on the particular situation of the vineyard. For example, in very dry climates, overlapping limits water loss, reducing the transpiration. Where there is little sun, in humid climates, it is better instead to arrange branches and leaves so that they take maximum solar energy, without too many overlaps that favor damp (and therefore diseases and rots). The variables are many.

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Our training systems and their pruning.

Our climate is mild-Mediterranean, hot and arid in summer, a little rainier in winter and spring. Our alluvial soils are over all lean and well-drained. In this condition, the best grapevine training systems are the low ones, subjected to short pruning, sometimes long (for some varieties), with vertical canopy. We have the Guyot and the spurred cordon.

PIEGATURA E LEGATURAGuyot: it is a very ancient traditional Italian system. It was incorrectly attributed to a French agronomist, Jules Guyot, who described it and spread it in his country in the 19th century. It is a low-production and a high-quality form. It is found in many parts of Italy, from Sicily to Piedmont. It is a mixed pruning system. It is perfect for those varieties that are more fertile in distal buds. It isn't an expanded form, suitable for not very fertile and drought soils, where the vine generally has a limited development. In the pruning, we cut a long cane, from which the future fruit-bearing canes will develop. A second cane is pruned at spur, which will serve for the next year.

 

CORDONE SPERONATOSpurred cordon: it is also traditional and it derives from Guyot. In this case, however, there is only the short pruning. It is suitable for low or medium fertility soils, even dry, and for those varieties that have good fertility on the proximal buds (the first ones). It is frequent in Tuscany and other Italian central regions. During the first years of the vineyard, the best cane is placed horizontally and it becomes a structural element of the plant. The gems on the underside are eliminated. In spring, fruiting canes will form from the upper buds. The following year, each cane will be cut into a spur, forming the cordon. Each subsequent year, it will be cut with short pruning. This system has been successful and has spread due to the excellent quality management of the vineyard, but also for simple and fast pruning.

 

 

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In our historic vineyards we also have:

Head-trained system (In Italian, “alberello”): it is traditional in Italy in the places of ancient Greek or Phoenician culture. It is one of the oldest forms. It is suitable for extremely dry, poorly fertile, or windy or very cold soils, where it is convenient to have a contained vegetation that remains close to the ground. It is at the lowest point of the productivity scale, with the highest sugar levels. It is found in Valle d'Aosta (which is semi-arid) and Sicily, for opposite climatic reasons. Pruning can be very short, as we do (the Greek system, the vites capitatae described by Columella), short or even long or mixed, depending on the territories and varieties.

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The pergola: the oldest representation is in the Egyptian tombs, where it is represented in the shape of a tunnel, as we have reproduced it at Guado al Melo. In Roman times, horizontal pergolas (called jugatio compluviata) were created to cover avenues and terraces, described by both Columella and Varro. Many variations developed, some more suitable for table grapes, others for wine production. It is a high-vine shape, with the branches well distributed on a more or less inclined surface, to capture the sun's rays to the maximum, avoid stagnation of humidity, but do not give excessive vigor. In Italy, for wine production, it is widely used in mountain areas, such as Trentino. Pruning can be of different types, depending on the territories and varieties.

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The trained-to-a-tree system or married vine: one of the oldest forms ever, that of our primeval tradition. I have already talked about it at length (here, here and here). It was not pruned at all, in the primitive viticulture. Later and until the twentieth century, it was subjected to long and rare pruning (every two years or even three). It was the system that guaranteed the most longevity of the vine, which frequently became over hundred years old (before phylloxera arrived from America, to complicate the life of the winemakers).


At Vinexpo Paris, with the TreBicchieri WorldTour

We’ll be in Paris Vinexpo, on 11th February  with the TreBicchieri World Tour of Gambero Rosso.

There will be, overall, the tastings of the prizewinning  Criseo Bolgheri DOC Bianco 2017, and other our great red wines.

Vinexpo Paris, Porte de Versailles

Pav. 7.2

Tuesday 11th February , h. 2.00-6.00 PM