It is well known that Greeks made the architectural plans and the Romans laid the basement of modern winemaking; France turned it not just into a building, but into a luxurious estate. Greeks were the first to start improving the taste and quality of their wines, first to add wine into their culture and first to introduce viticulture and winemaking in the south of France 2600 years ago. 500 years later the Romans granted the people in Southern France the right to produce wine and some 200 years later they surpassed the Romans in the quality of wine. They were first to introduce wooden barrels instead of amphoras for transportation and started cultivating grapes that could survive in a cooler climate outside southern France. Eventually they spread viticulture to the territory of modern Bordeaux, but at the end of the first century the emperor Domitian ordered to destroy most of the vineyards in France for the sake of Roman wine. But after 170 years another Roman emperor restored the French right to produce wine and French winemaking began its rise to glory.

After the fall of Roman Empire the Church overtook the protection over wine as it was a crucial and sacred element in various holy rituals including the most important – Eucharist. For the next thousand years the Church would be the bearer of winemaking, making wine itself more than an attribute of a certain country or empire, but rather erasing the borders and making it a common thing for all the religious inhabitants of Europe. Numerous monasteries took the burden of producing and improving the sacred beverage. The contribution of these small communities was immensely huge, because their almost religious passion resulted in the invention of many types of wine (including such as Champagne), developing new types of grapes and improving many winemaking technologies. While the center of the Church was still in Vatican (not for long by the way), it was France that became its first and most powerful agricultural and winemaking power.

Like it was mentioned wormwood was used long before Antonio’s attempts. The first recorded attempts of spicing the wine with wormwood were done by the Greeks, who were probably the first most inventive experimentations in everything related to wine. The tradition became popular in Germany and the result was a German wormwood flavored wine, which nevertheless was not much of a sweet wine. Actually wormwood at the time was used in cheap wines to mask unpleasant taste or flavors, so it was more of a technical measure (similar to the fortification of port wine). But the addition of other herbs allowed turning this into an exceptional wine that soon got its praise.

Today there are three general styles of vermouth, in order from driest to sweetest: extra dry, bianco/white, and sweet/red. The extra dry tends to be bitter reminding of the original wormwood tones. It is often consumed as an aperitif, mixed with ice and water, which allows feeling the overtones of the drink. In addition to this it became very popular in the world of cocktails as an ingredient with exceptional taste. From the first days the drink became successful and the first shop opened by Carpano started operating 24/7 shortly after the opening. Today it is produced by the Cinzano, Martini & Rossi, Campari and Gancia companies, which are famed for their aggressive competition. Martini for example has one of the most serious advertising utilizing such things as television and even racing to promote their brand.

P.S.

“Shaken not stirred” is one of the phrases that brought vermouth its global popularity. Coined by Ian Fleming for his fictional spy James Bond, it became one of the trademark phrases of martini (a cocktail that has vermouth as one of the main ingredients). Of course there is no way to check the truth of this fact but becoming an element of Bond’s luxurious life was a serious boost to the sales of martini. It would be interesting to get back in time and see what would happen if Bond had another trademark drink, for example port wine.

One of the key differences from other winemaking regions in Australia is Barossa’s Valley history. Unlike most of the regions populated by British colonists it was populated by Prussian refugees who fled Europe in mid 19^th century. Due to the cooler climate of their home region (which is a part of modern Poland) they had little knowledge of winemaking, but were skilled farmers. After trying to plant different cultures they found out that the valley was perfect for viticulture and started establishing vineyards (some of which are still there by the way). At first they started making the Riesling wine, a German type of wine, which due to the nature of the region was ripe and alcoholic. This start established the first vector for the Valley – the production of fortified wines. Eventually these wines earned the first praise for Barossa Valley winemakers.

Nevertheless the development of fortified wine production required red grapes and the region became widely associated with such grape as Shriaz. Things were going well until the mid-20^th century, when the whole wine trend moved away from fortified wine towards more sophisticated red table wines (made from Cabernet Sauvignon). The main potential and power of Barossa Valley became its main weakness and interest towards the wines from this region was lost. But like it’s said – good things come to those who wait!

Around the 1980^th the interest toward wines produced from old grape vines began to rise and surprisingly Barossa Valley with it up to 150 year old wines had a lot to offer. Local Shriaz finally got its praise for its deep and rich taste and the region suddenly became the leader of Australian winemaking. Just like in many other industries a refocus from the trend led to a rediscovery of the region’s potential and even despite few bad decades, the region is considered to be quintessential Australian wine region today.

While it is most famous for its signature grape variety of Shiraz, Barossa Valley also grows other grapes like Riesling, Semillon, Chardonnay, Grenache, Mourvedre and Cabernet Sauvignon. Today the region is focused on producing red wines, but white wine is also produced here and of course a number of traditional fortified wines are still produced in the area, just waiting for their time to get into the spotlight once again.

It is well known that lots of species from large cattle to tiniest bacteria that were brought by the European colonists to new worlds made huge damage to local life forms. The history of wine also has such case, but in its case the problem came from the new world and destruction was laid to one of the best winemaking region in the old world – France, it is called The Great French Wine Blight.

The blight was caused by a North American insect the grape phylloxera. It is a small aphid that lands of the vine injects its feeding tube into it and feeds from the grapevine, seems like a common parasite, but after the feeding process it leaves a small dose of venom inside the vine. As soon as the venom reaches the roots it kills the plant. Initially this insect existed only in North America and therefore some of the local grapevines were resistant to it. Around 1860 it was brought to Europe on an American vine and this was the beginning of the blight.

The main problem at that time was the little knowledge of biology, which eventually led to these horrible events. Initially phylloxera attacked the first vineyards in Florida in 16^th century, but the settlers thought that vines died because they were not adapted to local soil and choose to work with American grapevines instead (which were resistant to the parasite). Around the mid 19^th century steam boats replaced most of the traditional ships and travel across the ocean started taking less time. This was the main factor which allowed the phylloxera to reach Europe alive, presumably on a vine from the US and land in France.

French winemaker at first also were not viewing the insect as the source of the problem, even when noticed the phylloxera was classified as one of the consequences of the mysterious disease, but not as the cause of it. The farmers were just unable to tie the insect to the disease, because plants were dying after phylloxera left them and not during the feeding process. First cases occurred in 1863 and by the mid 1870^th 40% of French vineyards were destroyed by the insect. The aphid was tied to the disease only in 1868 and two years later and American entomologist Charles Valentine Riley confirmed this. Nevertheless there was still no way to fight the insect; the only solution was to combine European vines with American vines resistant to the venom. Eventually this proved to be efficient and allowed to replant all the damaged vineyards with new protected grapes.

The blight had a huge impact not just in France, but also spread worldwide and heavily damaged the wine industry in other countries. For example in the US the outbreak was followed by Prohibition, which eventually devastated the countries industry for the next few decades. Today there is still no way to fight phylloxera, but wineries developed their own strategy. Some of them use the outbreaks to renew their vineyards and plant new types of grapes as soon as the old die out.

The history of commercial production in the region began in the mid 19^th century. Local climate was close to Mediterranean climate so it was possible to grow quality grapes here. In 1858 first wine entered the local market and by the end of the century the number of wineries in the area reached 140. But like in many other parts of the world at that time the storm was yet to come.

Just like other wine regions in the late 19^th early 20^th century the region heavily suffered from phylloxera and then from Prohibition. During the time of prohibition some of the local winemakers had to re-focus on shipping grapes to illegal home winemakers to keep afloat. The end of Prohibition left the region devastated, without any demand for grapes and no working facilities to make wine. But the region started its rebuilding just before the Second World War and after the war the industry finally began growing. The important moment was that in 1938 Beaulieu winery hired André Tchelistcheff a wine expert, who introduced several new techniques and procedures to the region, including aging wine in small French Oak barrels, cold fermentation, vineyard frost prevention and malolactic fermentation. This allowed improving the wine production and making full use of the local climate.

Starting from the 60^th the region began the rise to its fame. The wine producers of the valley started following the trend of wine replacing beer as a women’s drink and used this opportunity to raise their sales. But the real turning point for the Napa Valley came in 1976 on the Paris Wine Tasting. Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon from the region won in blind testing and Napa Valley got serious critical acclaim, as a region capable of producing world class wines. In 1981 it was recognized as American Viticultural Area, which gave additional possibilities to establish and promote the region as a brand.

Napa Valley is a great example of a region that through its hard work and dedication managed to overcome a number of serious setbacks including the two most serious problems in the history of wine – phylloxera and Prohibition. With the improvement after disaster strategy it managed to modernize the region in the late 30^th and even replant a number of vineyards after a recent phylloxera outbreak in the 1980^th, aiming to adapt new types of grapes. Today it represents the only part of the US that resurrected and even internationally succeeded in wine production.

Colonized by the Spanish South America was destined to become a winemaking region. Nevertheless a number of political issues had a very negative influence on the whole continent and only recently two main wine producers of South America – Argentina and Chile, began their rise to worldwide fame in the world of wine.

Argentina

Argentina is considered to be most promising of the New World wine regions. It has over 400 year of winemaking tradition brought here by Spanish missionaries, huge inner wine consumption and wine was even recently appointed as national liquor. Like many other countries in South America due to a number of social and political factors Argentina started aiming at export only in 1990^th (following the example of Chile), but a merely decade later it entered the list of top world exporters and gain serious recognition by experts.

Argentina has lots of regions suitable for winemaking; due to high altitudes they are safe from most of the grape diseases and parasites. Over the centuries european immigrants from different parts of Europe took their winemaking experience and helped establishing an industry in this promising region. With the start of the export the industry got modernizations and today this country is considered to be the sleeping giant of wine production due to its huge potential and almost a national dedication to wine.

Chile

Chile is currently world’s fifth largest exporter of wines and the ninth largest producer. The main secret of this land is that it was blessed by a large coastal mountain region with a climate somewhere between California and France. Also just like many things created in the so called New World Chilean winemakers had a unique possibility to use the experience of the Old World and create a unique fusion.

Initially like in other South American countries the viticulture was brought here by Spanish conquistadors for church purposes, but with the growth of Chilean winemaking Spain unsuccessfully tried to control it by limiting the export and production. Chile mostly ignored the mainland orders and in time local winemakers got more interested in French winemaking experience. In addition to this after the phylloxera plight many French winemakers moved to Chile, which was never affected by this plague of winemaking. Both of these factors eventually boosted the Chilean wine industry. Another simple but significant step occurred in the 1980^th when the winemakers in Chile switched the material of aging barrels from rauli beechwood to oak and stainless steel. This eliminated a special taste that was accepted by the local markets, but found unpleasant by international tasters. In addition to this the winemakers started aiming at improving the quality of the wine, which eventually paid off.

At the turn of the millennium Chilean winemaking skyrocketed to success in blind wine tastings.  For example from 2004 to 2006 it occupied the top spots in many tastings in Europe, South America and Asia. In addition to this it found its way to new markets all over the world and is currently taking market segments from other imported wines.

In 1679 the next governor Simon van der Stel purchased a large estate, recruited French winemakers and established a serious wine production facility and vineries. Hi named the estate Constantia and that name was just few decades ago from becoming famous in the world of wine. Van der Stel was dead serious about the quality of his product so he set a number of serious standards for farmers and winemakers. As a result the Constantia wines were highly praised on European market as the first good New World wine (even Napoleon was rumored to praise the Constantia wine). In 55 years the death of Simon van der Stel the slowed down business was purchased by a businessman Hendrik Cloete, who put a lot of effort into the estate and managed to restore the fame of Constantia wine.

In 1816 South Africa was transferred under British rule, which opened new possibilities for winemakers. The Kingdom was at the time satisfied with wine from Portugal, but the renounced South African wines also were of interest and so the wine from the Cape landed on the British market. In addition to this American merchants were also interested in this wine and trading reached over the ocean. Unfortunately this was the highest point in the history of South African winemaking; the worst was yet to come.

Starting from the mid 19^th century the vineries were ravaged first by oidium and then by the horrible phylloxera epidemic. It took nearly 20 years to recover from the least epidemic and most of the vineries in the country were replanted. In 1900^th the winemaking was restored, but the global market was not interested in wine and therefore a large number of produced wine was simply poured into local water sources. The government responded with forming the Koöperatieve Wijnbouwers Vereniging van Zuid-Afrika Bpkt (KWV) an organization aimed at controlling the wine production. Unfortunately by 1924 it became a monopolist and buried the local winemaking industry under bureaucracy and conservatism.

The 20th Century was truly not the best time for South African wine. Tied with the political changes in the world and followed by a boycott tied to apartheid, the wine production nearly met its end. Luckily with the end of apartheid in the 1990^th the interest towards this wine industry was resurrected and KWV was reformed into a private owned structure. This allowed introducing new technologies and within few decades boosting the country to the list of top wine exporters. Currently South Africa occupies 4% of global wine export market. But what is more important is that more and more black people become involved in wine making. Who knows maybe this fresh blood will allow developing the potential of the region and restoring the old fame of Constantia wines.

Around the end of the 18^th century champagne managed to undergo a unique transformation as a brand. It was always a symbol of success and good life and it managed to keep this image even after it became available to common consumers. “Remember, gentlemen, it’s not just France we are fighting for, it’s Champagne!” is a World War 2 quote by Winston Churchill that clearly indicates that Champagne was no longer an elite drink and could be used as an image to inspire the common people.

Just like with many other thing as for contemporary culture Hollywood had a major influence on champagne. Alfred Hitchcock in his movie Champagne used the drink as an image, just like Billy Wilder’s The Champagne Waltz. The famous spy James Bond was not the first, but one of the most important movie contributors to the champagne fame. Although he usually drinks vodka-martini he also drank Bollinger and Dom Perignon in a number of movies, giving the brands some additional fame and mysterious image. In a more recent movie history a notable contribution to Cristal was also made by famous (or infamous) filmmaker Quentin Tarantino. His character was praising this champagne in one of the segment of the Four Rooms movie. Just like in many Tarantino movies the over-attention to details formed a strong image of the brand which may have caused the hype in the hip-hop culture.

So apart from Dom Perignon One of the most famous brands of champagne today is Cristal. For some reason it was picked up by successful hip-hop artists and became one of the images of success worldwide. It was not only used as a visual imagery, but also referenced in various lyrics. Rock artists have also adapted sparkling wine as their success element, but not with such a serious attitude as their hip-hop colleagues.

One more important contribution to the image for champagne was its association with success and victory. It was a very long tradition to present expensive Champagne as a price and also to smash bottles against buildings, ships and vehicles as some sort of sacrifice. Also starting from 1967, the tradition of spilling wine was established at the Le Man Racing, continuing the old sacrificial tradition in a new form. All of these factors and influences helped to establish the image of Champagne as we know it today – as a drink suitable for celebrations and symbolizing success.

According to history the first Europeans who reached North America were the Vikings and they named the continent Vinland. Clearly the name comes from local discovered viticulture, which means that unlike Australia the continent had its own grapes. Nevertheless the art of winemaking was brought here only centuries late by European settlers who established basically few large winemaking regions in the Eastern, South Western and Central parts of the continent.

USA

Unfortunately for the United States even with the huge potential of such winemaking region as California, the American wine met too much obstacles and misfortunes and managed to get some kind of success only few decades ago.

The first wine was produced from the local grapes in the US close to the end of 16^th century. Although it was real wine, the settlers were not satisfied by the taste overtones, so they had to wait for another 50 years for import of European viticulture and then started to develop it. Only by the end of the 18^th century the first commercial winemaking was established in the east, but more important is that around the same time it came to California from Mexico. In the century that followed, American winemaking met a whole bunch of natural disasters destroying vineyards all over the country and finally met its demise with the prohibition. By the end of the Prohibition Era American winemaking was practically destroyed and what was even more important the consumers lost interest to quality wines. The US had to establish winemaking as education and as a profession and luckily the young specialists were able to help. Around 1970^th California was resurrected as a real winemaking region.

While California is the largest US producer of wines today, efforts are made to establish a more serious winemaking in other regions with suitable climates such as Arizona. But the real results of these efforts are yet to come. It is safe to say that current wine industry in the United States is still young and will have a lot to offer in future.

Mexico

Mexico colonized by the Spanish during their probably most religious period in history, so wine was practically a national interest at first. Wine production was established here in 1597 and was the first on the continent. There were not much natural problems with planting grapes, but the political and social issues became a problem.

Even though Mexico is a Spanish language country over the decades it lost interest in wine replacing it with tequila and beer, this made it hard for winemakers. In addition to this all the hard times for Mexico as a colony and the following wars and revolutions were not very good for the development of winemaking. So an industry established by the clergy was first nationalized and after that passed to private owners started coming to prominence only in 1980^th.

Today most of the hopes of Mexican winemaking lie with the Baja California region. In the recent years Mexican wines won a number of awards recently and there is still hope that local winemaking will stick to its Spanish roots and present something interesting.

“At the 1873 Vienna Exhibition the French judges, tasting blind, praised some wines from Victoria, but withdrew in protest when the provenance of the wine was revealed, on the grounds that wines of that quality must clearly be French.”

This is probably the best quote to start an article about Australian wine. Today Australia is recognized as one of the top wine producing regions in the world. It has well known wine producing areas that provide high quality wines praised by many experts. But actually Australian winemakers had to make a very long way to get this recognition, maybe even the most difficult among all the New World regions.

The colonized regions always had a more difficult situation than European countries. Beside from the fact that they had to compete with thousand year long winemaking and viticulture experience of European wine producing regions, they also often suffered from a lack of local winemaking experts and territories suitable for planting vineyards. But if such regions were found they usually had a benefit of a unique local microclimate that in the hands of a skilled winemaker allowed making a product with its own taste qualities.

Wine cuttings were first brought to the continent from South Africa by governor Philipp in 1788 and this was the start of the Australian wine. In took 32 years to adapt the grapes and sell the first wines domestically and two more years to start exporting it. During the 19^th century local winemaking was boosted by introduction of grapevine cultures from France and Spain and by a flow of free emigrants from Europe, who possessed skill and interest in winemaking. And as you read in the starting quote, be the end of the century Australian wine got its first worldwide praise.

Just like in most winemaking regions the 20^th century was not the brightest for Australian wines. The phylloxera epidemic at the turn of the century lest the industry weakened for decades and only by the 1970^th Australia was able to begin focusing on complex wines (before that the production was focused mostly on sweet and fortified types). In addition to this inner economical grapevine market problems are constantly harming the potential of the industry. But this can hardly stop the local winemakers, who give their best to provide good product and earn their praise on the global market. Australian wine today is exported to many different parts of the world making the country the fourth biggest exporter behind Italy, France and Spain. The crucial markets for Australia today are the US, UK and Asia (which is consuming mostly Australian wine).

Among all the wine producing parts of the world Australia had a late start, no local grape cultures, little land suitable for winemaking and a serious shortage of specialists. Nevertheless the hard work of Australian winemakers paid off and today the country has a name in the world of wine. Just like in a song by a world famous Australian band “It’s a long way to the top” (c), but the top is always worth it.