In recent years there has been a serious confrontation between the two most well-known containers used for wine-making: on the one hand the wooden bar­rel, on the other the amphora, which has come back into fashion following the outstanding work of several wine-makers and oenologists who, with considera­ble ability, have breathed new life into the use of a container that had – although not completely – disap­peared from the scene.

The challenge, however, was not confined simply to the oenological field, but often took the form of ide­ological ‘shores’, where the use of the amphora was depicted as a sort of return to the ‘origins’, to a past almost irremediably lost to contemporary man. However, the use of the amphora did not disappear by chance or because of a conspiracy inspired by modern industry, but because its use was drastically overtak­en by the potential hidden behind the container that we all know: the wooden barrel.

This “admirable instrument”, as defined by one of the most important French wine historians, Yves Re­nouard, began to be used in the Gallic-Roman regions of the French Alps as early as the second century AD, and by the end of the fourteenth century had become the standard container for the transport of wine and for vinifying grapes throughout Europe. However, the use of terracotta jars did not disappear completely, especially in the Mediterranean area, but the barrel was the best option for large-scale transportation: this wasn’t due to tasting reasons, but to logistical and economic reasons. At the very beginning of XV century the commercial revolution, which had started in the second half of XIII century, had reached its peak and ratified the birth of mass marketing for several goods, especially heavy goods such as wine (the so-called big goods). For the first time, it was finally possible to ship large quantities of wine, through long sea and land routes, from one side to the other of the known world.

In this scenario, the amphora was not regarded as a suitable container: it was fragile, bulky and, since it required at least two people for the loading and unloading operations it should not be too heavy. Be­cause of this, it had a very low capacity.

The barrel, on the other hand, being more manage­able, could be lifted with winches without too many dangers and was able to contain hundreds of liters. In a certain sense, it can be said that thanks to the barrel wines could easily be transported for long dis­tances constantly and efficiently, thus making the use of barrels so well known that they lay the founda­tions of the current world of wine. Today, the choice of terracotta or wood is luckily not based on logistical issues but only – and here is its beauty – on organo­leptic reasons.

How old a procedure is compared to another can’t be the reason for prevarication, but rather a reason for precious diversification, otherwise why stopping at amphorae and not moving backwards?

A pioneering and entertaining article on the history of wineskins was published in a recent publication on the history of leather. The Greek word ἀσκός is perhaps not very familiar to us: it is the sack of skin (wineskin) mentioned in the Gospel of St. Mark, where it is said “Vino nuovo in otri nuovi”. Could this be the solution to go back to the golden age? I don’t know, but it is believed that the more the history of wine is investigated, savouring its complicated heterogeneity, the more we shall be able to understand that diversity enriches and unifies, rather than dividing.
by Daniele Ognibene
www.ilsommeliermagazine.it

“One day, Dionysus was the guest of Eneo (Oineùs) and fell in love with his wife Altea. When Eneo re­alized this, he decided to leave the city on a pre­text. Dionysus slept with Altea, and their union led to the birth of Deianira; then, in exchange for his generous hospitality, Dionysus gave a vine to Eneo and taught him how to plant it, stipulating that his offering be called Oinos, in honor of the name of his host.” (Igino, Myths, 129).

One of the many myths about the origin of wine (this one being of Thessalic origin) was established well before the arrival of Dionysus himself in the Greek Pantheon. The myth dates back, in fact, to the third millennium BC (the Sumerian period) and is the founding poem of western culture: the Gil­gamesh Epic, wherein the figure of Siduri, “the girl who makes wine”, is custodian of the knowledge (of “thought” and “word”, hence lògos), which perhaps allows mortals, by means of a fleeting Montalian “passage”, to achieve a connection with the Beyond.

The “spiritual” drink that Siduri gives to Gilgamesh is by no means “natural”, but absolutely “cultur­al”, a watershed between the wilderness (vitis labrusca and grapes picked from the vine) and civ­ilization (vitis vinifera and the domesticated vine). Wine, therefore, in ancient mysticism, is a vi­tal element “par excellence”, which, over the centuries, became the Blood of Christ and a formidable metaphor for the three monotheis­tic religions of the Mediterranean basin. Even the prohibition of its consumption in the Islam­ic world is an implicit recognition of the ritual power of the nectar of wine.

In fact, the success of a drink that has accompa­nied homo occidentalis since 7,000 BC could not be explained if its origin were not anchored to the Myth: hence the belief in its magical, esoteric or pharmacological properties: Caesar uses wine to fight an epidemic of plague that threatens his ranks (Plutarch, Vita Caesaris). In the ninth cen­tury the Salerno Medical School recommended its use in a “sober diet”: “Inter pastam bibe vinum!”

So much of the vocabulary of our world derives from the Myth: the grape itself (àmpelos) takes its name from the first love of Dionysus, the satyr Ampelo, whence for example, the word ampelog­raphy originated.Many names of vines remind us of archaic stories, of the migration of populations, myths lost in the mists of time: Aglianico, Casavecchia, Malvasia, Teroldego, and so on.Despite the contribution of technology, and de­spite the very modern way of producing it, wine, in some ways, is still a Myth; it is enough to think of champagne and its evocative power.Man will always need the Myth as religio (glue, from “rilegare” (“bind”)), able to “compensate” social inequalities (Barbera and Champagne, G. Gaber), and to create a “cultured” awareness, able to stimulate the action of a community to­wards a goal: wine, a link between archaic ele­ments and allegorical legends, will accompany us in this pleasantly insinuating way, throughout the coming millennia.
di ANTONIO MAZZITELLI
Articolo tratto da“Il Sommelier”