Just How Old Is Your Wine?

With that title you probably thought I was referring to the wine that might be in your glass. I’ll get to that a little later, but your original impression wasn’t too far off – it’s all how you look at it. We may refer to vintages by the year the grapes were harvested, but I assure you that without a rooted vine, there would be no wine. So here’s a few thousand years of wine history summed up in a paragraph or two for a common foundation.

Ancient Greek Amphorae

There is archaeological evidence to suggest that the earliest wine production dates back to 6000 BC in Georgia and Iran, and the earliest European wine production uncovered in Macedonia dates back 6,500 years ago. Among the many advancements of ancient Greece was that of numerous wine making practices that are still used today, not to mention the first successful storage vessels called amphorae (am-FOR-ee). To keep the wine from spoiling, they floated olive oil on the surface as a barrier for oxidation; thus, the Greeks were the first to successfully age and mature wine. The Greeks traded not only wine, but the vine as well throughout Europe, which included parts of southern France, Portugal and Spain, and Enotria, meaning “land of wine”, known today as Italy. The Romans were the first to have a basic understanding of terroir (ter-WAH), learned how to match specific grape varieties to their ideal climates and growing conditions, advanced in full scale breeding of wine grape vines, implemented trellising and vineyard maintenance, and spread wine throughout modern-day Italy, France, Portugal, Spain, Germany, and beyond during their reign. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the Catholic Church was the only entity strong enough to preserve the cultural aspects of wine production through the Dark Ages, and is known to have first planted and maintained some of the top European vineyards and wine regions in existence today. Spanish missionaries were the first to plant Vitis Vinifera (Vy-tis vin-uh-FER-uh) vines in, what is today, the United States in the 1590’s (most likely in the New Mexico area). The cork (produced from the bark of the cork oak tree) was first introduced in the 1600’s. The first wine grapes planted in California are believed to have been near the Mission San Diego in 1768. Louis Pasteur was the scientist that discovered and proved that microscopic yeast cells were responsible for fermentation in 1857. Wine makers in southern France nearly wiped out the worlds stock of wine grape vines in the 1860’s when they brought the American native Vitis labrusca (table grape vines) back to France with phylloxera in the dirt; and Thomas Munson of Denison, Texas developed rootstocks to resist it, and they were shipped all over the wine making world in the late 1880’s for grafting. Prohibition in the US began on January 17^th, 1920 and lasted 13 years until it was repealed in 1933.





Now to bring us a little closer to that glass of wine you’re holding now. Steven Spurrier (an Englishman who made his living selling premium French wines as a merchant in Paris) organized what is known today as the “Spurrier Tasting” or the “Judgment of Paris” on May 24^th, 1976. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend the movie “Bottle Shock” (released on August 6^th, 2008) as it’s based on this permanent mark in history, and is a “must have” movie for any wine enthusiast. Unfortunately, like all “based on true story” movies, it’s not entirely accurate. “Bottle Shock” implies that the blind tasting event was intended to be fair; however, the official judges were all French wine authorities, authors, sommeliers, and wine makers, and the California wines were pitted against the top white wines from Burgundy and the top red wines from Bordeaux. Nonetheless, Napa Valley’s 1973 Chateau Montelena Chardonnay was still chosen as the top white wine, and 1973 Stags Leap Cellars SLV Cabernet Sauvignon was chosen as the top red wine. Because the prestigious French wines fell impossibly to those of California at the hands of their own advocates, the world of wine would never again be the same! But wait, it gets even better. After the blind tasting in 1976, the French cried foul and claimed that California wines were meant to drink young while French wines would improve with age, only then showing their best qualities. So in 1986 a group of French and American wine critics agreed to reenact the Spurrier Tasting with the same wines from the original vintages, now that they had matured for ten years. Believe it or not, the California wines won again and actually did better than in the original tasting. Not only did these tasting events open the doors to wine makers all over the world, but it’s an interesting coincidence that France began to ease regulations for some of their classifications of wine in the late 1970’s, and Tuscan winemakers began experimenting with nontraditional grapes and blends that make up the Super Tuscan wines we’re familiar with today.




 Now for the glass you have in front of you. Never before in history has there been such an immeasurable supply of quality wines, from so many different regions around the world, and so readily available to virtually everyone. Maybe your wine is the polished product of grapes harvested 4 years ago, that were produced from vines planted 50 years ago, that came from the cuttings of vines that were grafted to Texas rootstocks 120 years ago, that were carefully tended to by our diligent ancestors for hundreds of years prior to that. So before your next drink, slow down and look, I mean REALLY SEE, SMELL, TASTE and EMBRACE the art, craftsmanship, and history that’s in your glass. Those grapes came from vines that have been bred for thousands of years to produce the perfection you hold in your hand today. It’s likely that today’s $10 bottle of wine is significantly superior to anything that was once produced and maintained solely for royalty not that long ago. If you can’t afford what they say is the best, then enjoy the best that you can afford. It doesn’t have to cost $50 to $100 to be absolutely delicious!