Aalborg
The town in the north of Denmark (province of Jutland), where all the Danish Akvavit – a government monopoly – is made
Abboccato
Italian for sweet or medium sweet when applied to wines. The same to all intents as moelleux (qv), it is mostly applied to the wines of Orvieto, which are usually classified as seco (dry) or abboccato.
Absinthe
Comes from the Latin absinthium, which is wormwood, a bitter plant. As applied to spirits, it is a strong spirituous liquor of opaline-green colour, made with the pounded leaves and flowering tops of one species of wormwood plant, Artemesia absinthium, together with other herbs such as angelica root, fennel, nettles, parsley, balm, sweet flag root and hyssop. It was invented at Couvet in the Canton of Neuchatel, Switzerland, around 1730 and became popular in the French army in the early part of the 19th century as an antidote to fever. Later, its use was forbidden, but whether because it was being drunk to excess or because it was thought to have (if drunk to excess) bad effects on the nervous system is not known. Absinthe – or at least the legal copies now made – is drunk diluted with water, which when added to the spirit turns it a cloudy opalescent colour.
Absolute Alcohol
Pure alcohol, entirely free from water. This cannot be obtained by distillation alone. The rectified spirit or alcohol of the pharmacopoeias contains 16 per cent. by weight of water in Great Britain and 9 per cent. in the United States. Proof spirit or diluted alcohol contains 51 per cent by weight of water in Great Britain and 54.5 in the United States. (see also Proof Spirit).
Abtsberg
German for Abbots Hill, famous vineyard of the commune of Graach, which is on the Moselle.
Acerbe. (French)
When applied to wine means hard, rough and disagreeable. From the Latin acerbus, bitter, harsh, sour.
Acescence
French word meaning a disposition towards acidity.
Acetic Acid
The acid of vinegar formed by the oxidisation of ethyl alcohol with the aid of a fungus called Mycoderma aceti, and which forms a white film over contaminated wine. When the acetic acid becomes too strong the wine tastes sour and becomes a pricked wine. White wines containing over .120 grams per 100 cc. and reds containing over 140 grams per 100 cc. are on the way to vinegar.
Achaia
A large wine making area around the Gulf of Corinth, Greece.
Acidity, Fixed
A semi-technical term used in the wine trade and understood to mean the natural acid content of a wine.
Acido
Spanish for acid.
Acids
Fruit acids are the normal constituent of all good wine and they are in the grape juice while it is on the vine.
Adega
The Portuguese word for bodega (q.v.).
Advocaat
A thick, almost custard like liqueur which should be made from brandy and eggs. Originally of Dutch origin, it is now made in most countries. It is easily imitated by making it with yellow cornflour and inferior spirit.
Affenthaler
One of Germany’s few red wines (made with the Pinot Noir) produced near Buehl in Baden. The growers use a long black hock-shaped bottle with a monkey embossed into the glass, which is then gilded. This is because Affe is German for monkey Affenthal is a corruption of Ave-Maria-Thal. Thal is valley and there is a monastery in the vicinity.
Africa
See Algeria, Morocco, South Africa.
Agave
The century plant (Agave americana) from which is made Pulque (q.v.), the almost national drink of Mexico and many parts of South America.
Age of Wines
See Maturing Wines.
Aglianico del Vulture
On the slopes of the 4,300 ft. high Mt. Vulture in the centre of the province of Lucania (Italy) is made Aglianico del Vulture, a dry, deep ruby coloured wine. It matures well.
Agrafe (French)
The name of the metal clip used to hold in place the first cork used in champagnes and other sparkling wines.
Aguapie
Wine of low quality made in Spain from the second pressing of the grapes. For household use only.
Aguardiente. (Spanish)
A Spanish spirit usually made from the grape. The word is a corruption of agua (water) and ardiente (burning). The Portuguese is Aguardente.
Ahr
The most northerly wine region (the smallest, only 370 hectares, as against the next smallest, Nahe 2,000 hectares) of Germany and, probably, the world. The River Ahr is a tributary of the Rhine, and the wines are mainly – minor – red. Some vineyards are : Ahrweiler, Walporzheim, Altenahr, Mayschoss, Dernau.
Aigre
A town in the Charente departement of France with a considerable brandy trade.
Aix-en-Provence
The headquarters town of the Riviera wines of La Palette, Bellet, Bandol and Cassis.
Akvavit
See Aquavit.
Al Deslio (Spanish)
The term used for racking off a wine into a fresh cask.
Alambrado (Spanish)
Literally, wire netting. Used in Spanish to denote a kind of wire wrapping used for the finer wines.
Alameda
A county in North California. Its best vineyards are in the Livermore Valley, S.E. of San Francisco, and are planted with Sauvignon Blanc, Ugni Blanc, and Semillon grapes. The white wines are some of the best in California.
Alba Flora
The name of a white wine made in Majorca.
Alban Hills
Called Colli Albani and situated S.E. of Rome on volcanic slopes, these wines (sometimes called Albano) were praised in early Roman times by both Horace and Pliny. The are white, semi-sweet and officially recommended to serve with fish.
Albana di Romagna
From the province of Emilia, these Albana wines are made around a tiny town – Bertinoro – in the Romagna Hills which got it name through the excellence of its wine. In about AD. 435, Galla Placida, Regent of the Western Empire, was on her way to Ravenna and stopped at a little village and was given a glass of this white wine in an inelegant cup. Oh, golden wine, you are too exquisite to be drunk in a rustic mug! To do you honour, I shall have to drink you in gold! Thus, Bertinoro (drink-you-in-gold). Not to be confused with Roman Alban wines.
Albania
Wines of tolerable quality are made almost everywhere.
Albariza. (Spanish)
A brilliant greyish-white soil which powders in summer and turns to a treacherous paste in winter.
The word comes from the Spanish albar, whitish. The best sherry-making albariza vineyards are situated to the north-west of Jerez right up to near Puerto de Santa Maria, and there are other areas near Sanlucar and Chiclana.
Albillo
Name of a Spanish grape used on albariza and barros soils for producing sherry.
Albumen
Present in traces in wine. A substance which is nearly pure in whites of eggs. An important fining for fine wines.
Alcohol
The word comes from Arabic and the original meaning was as remote from its present sense as anything could be. Ezekiel, Ch. 23, v. 40 didst wash thyself, paintedst thine eyes Alcohol was a fine metallic powder stain the eyes. Then, by extension, it became, in early chemistry, any fine powder. Now the word is short for alcohol of wine this being the most familiar of the rectified spirits, and is a chemical compound containing carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. Unless otherwise specified, the word now, in the singular, means : ethyl alcohol (C2H2OH) and is produced by distilling fermented liquors. Diluted with wood alcohol, (CH3OH) or other denaturants, ethyl alcohol becomes methylated spirit. Medicinally speaking, though rarely appreciated, alcohol is a sedative rather than a stimulant.
Alcoholic Strength
In nearly all wine-producing countries the quantity of ethyl alcohol in a wine is reckoned in degrees of alcohol, but in England it is counted in degrees of proof spirit, the standard of which is a proof (q.v.) gallon. 1 degree of alcohol = 1.8 degrees proof spirit; 10 degrees of alcohol = 17.7 proof spirit; while 15, 20 24 degrees of alcohol = 24.7, 35.2, 42.6 degrees of proof spirit respectively.
Aldegund
A commune in the Lower Moselle district: Some vineyards: Palmberg, Kloster-kammer, Hotlay.
Aldehydes
Short for Alcohol dehydrogenatum, i.e. deprived of hydrogen. The generic term for a class of chemical bodies which, save for formaldehyde, which is a gas, are all volatile liquids. They are produced by the oxidisation of primary alcohols and are present in varying degrees in table wines, sherries and brandies. Some chemists consider that to measure the aldehyde content of sherries and, more so, brandies is of considerable use but of little value for table wines.
Aldrich, Dr. Henry
He was Dean of Christ Church in 1700. He wrote the famous epigram (in Latin) which was thus rendered into English: If all be true that I do think, There are five reasons we should drink : Good wine, a friend, or being dry, Or lest we should be by-and-by, Or any other reason why.
Aleatico
First: The name of a sweet red Muscat-flavoured grape which has spread from its home in Italy to California and there makes a soft, fruity, aromatic dessert wine, light red in colour, and sometimes called a red Muscatel. Second: In Italy it stands for a red wine made with the Aleatico grape and produced in Tuscany, Umbria, Latium, Lucania and Apulia. It is particularly good on the island of Elba, where Aleatico di Portoferraio is an esteemed dessert wine. Napoleon, when exiled on the island from May 1814 to February 1815, interested himself in the cultivation of this species of grape.
Alella.
A strong, earthy, pleasant white wine made around a little town of that name just north of Barcelona. The growers, in selling the wine, use the phrase. The wine the Romans drank but this appears to have no historical significance, save that the Romans were in this part of Spain and must perforce have drunk this and all the local wines.
Alembic. or Alambic
Derived from an Arabian word meaning a still used for distilling spirits.
Algeria
In average years the vineyards of this part of Metropolitan France, which cover 350,000 hectares, produce no less than 300,000,000 gallons (15,000,000 hectolitres) of wine, and thus challenge Spain as the third largest wine producing area in the world, only outstripped by France and then Italy. Of this vast total, some 80 per cent. is red or rose, and 20 per cent. white, and for the red it is the Carignane grape which yields a well-made, highly coloured. fruity wine; followed by the Cinsault which is used on the plains; and lastly, the Alicante Bouschet which makes a drier wine and which is often blended with the first two. Algerian rose wines are a blend of three grapes: the Aramon, Cinsault and Grenache; while the white wines come from the Clairette de Provence and Ugni Blanc. Roughly speaking, one can divide the wines into categories :
1. Wines of the plains, which have an alcoholic content of 10 to 11 degrees, and which come from the departements of Alger and Constantine.
2. Wines of the hillsides which are made behind Oran and which attain 11 to 13 degrees.
3. Wines of the mountains, which grow at an altitude of 2,400 to 4,500 feet above sea level, and which attain some 15 to 16 degrees in favourable years.
The most famous vineyards are in the region of Medea and Miliaria (Alger departement) Dahra (between Alger and Oran), and the famous vineyard of Mascara (Oran). Other wine making places are: Oran : Mostaganem, Tabia, Chanzy, Sidi-Belabbes, Tlemcen. Alger : Tiaret, Bougainville , Orleansville, Tenes, Miliania (Cotes de Zaccar), Aumale, Tizi-Ouzou, Medea. Constantine : Bone, Philippeville, Guebar, Guelma, Jemmapes. Little of the wine is consumed in Algeria itself; nearly all goes to France
(a) to be used to blend with thinner wines, and
(b) for the basis of aperitifs.
Alf
A town on the Lower Moselle situated just where, vinously speaking, the Lower Moselle ends and the Middle Moselle (making the fine wines) begins. Some vineyards: Kapellenberg, Herrenberg, Kronenberg.
Alicante
Called in English in the 16th and 17th centuries Aligaunte, Alicant, Alycaunt, etc. Buttered beer coloured with AIlicant – Beaumont and Fletcher. Bedew it with a bottle of sack or Alegant – Bacon in Sylvia. Made in the Levante, the south-eastern part of Spain, in and around the seaboard town of Alicante, this wine used to be very popular in England until it was ousted by the cheaper wines of Tarragona (q.v.). The Alicante vineyards now produce some 9 million gallons of wine annually; it is red (there is a little rose made) and sweetish.
Alicante-Bouschet
A heavy yielding red wine grape developed in the 19th century by M. Bouschet. Makes lower grade wines in the south of France. Third most used grape in California.
Aligote
The name of a minor quality white wine producing grape of the Burgundy area. It is permitted by law in France only if the label states that this grape has been used.
Almijar. (Spanish)
The yard in which the grapes are grown.
Aloxe-Corton.
The most northerly and a very important, commune of the Cote de Beaune district of the Cote d’Or, Burgundy. Actually the communes of Ladoix-Serrigny and Pernand-Vergelesses are counted in with Aloxe-Corton. Mostly red wine, but the small quantity of white wine produced is very fine.
The Pinot Noir and Chardonnay are the only grapes permitted and the maximum rendement (amount allowed to be made) to the hectare is 35 hectolitres. The most reputed vineyards are: Les Bressandes, Le Corton, Le Clos du Roi, Charlemagne. Les Renardes, Les Chaumes, Les Meix, Les Pougets.
Alsace
The Alsatian vineyards are spread over the eastern slopes of the Vosges, where some 30,000 families of vinegrowers produce 600,000 hectolitres on an average each year.
Roughly speaking. the vineyards run along the Rhine (but the better ones are on the slopes of the Vosges Mountains) from Strasbourg, through Selestat and Colmar, down to Mulhouse.
The wine made is nearly all white and from the Tokay (also called the Grey Pinot), Muscat, Traminer, Gewtirtztraminer, Riesling, Knipperle, Chasselas, Sylvaner and Burger grapes. Alsatian wines are bottled in long blue-green Moselle bottles and are called generally by the names of the grapes which have made the wine.
In England of these one sees, in ascending order of quality: Sylvaner, Riesling, Muscat, Traminer and Gewurtztraminer. Gentil, or Edelzwicker, occasionally seen on labels, signifies a blend of wines made from higher grade grapes, while Zwicker is a wine blended from cheap grapes.
The Alsatian wine districts are subdivided into Upper Alsace (Haut Rhin) with the following vineyard/communes : Colmar, Ammerschwihr, Beblenheim, Riquewilhr, Hunawihr, Ribeauville, Mittelwihr, Thann, Rouffach, Turkheim ; and Lower Alsace (Bas Rhin) : Dambach, Goxwiller, Barr, Andlau, Gertwiller, Molsheim, Ottrott, Kintzheim. The fine wines are made in the Haut Rhin.
Alsheim
Wine making town/commune in the middle of the Rheinhesse, north of Worms and south of Nierstein. Some vineyards: Hahl, Goldberg, Fischerpfad, Karstweg, Rust, Romerberg, Sonnenberg.
Altar Wines
See Eucharistic Wines.
Altenahr
A district on the River Ahr where medium quality red wines are still made, but in much smaller quantities than heretofore.
Amarante
Red or white Portuguese table wine named after the town of Amarante some 50 miles east of Oporto.
Ambares
A town/commune 14 km. north of Bordeaux in the Entre-deux-Mers region, making red wines with the legal right to be called Bordeaux and Bordeaux Superieur . Some vineyards are: Chateaux Parabelle (80 hogsheads annually), du Tillac (100 hogsheads), Formont (40 hogsheads), Peychaud (160 hogsheads), du Gua (320hogs heads), Beausejour (100 hogsheads), Jean-Prat (100 hogsheads). There are also some 50 estates producing an average of 60 hogsheads annually and further 100 who make an average of 8.
Ambes
A village/commune 26 km. north of Bordeaux, making vins rouges ordinaires which are permitted to be called Bordeaux and Bordeaux Superieur. Some vineyards Chateaux Beauregard (200 hogsheads annually), Lansac (60 hogsheads), Godchot (50 hogsheads), Gasquet (60 hogsheads), SainteBarbe (200 hogsheads), Jamois (40 hogsheads), Puynormand (160 hogsheads).
Ambonnay
An important red wine growing district in the Montagne de Reims area, south of Reims and north of Epernay.
Ambrosia
Means pertaining to the immortals. The fabled food or drink of the gods.
American Wines, North
The industry was started when European grapes (Vitis vinifera, the European species which makes all the great wines, is not indigenous to the New World) were introduced into California (q.v.) by Catholic priests-padres.
The principal grape was the so-called Mission, a dual purpose type for wine and table use which, though now considered to make a poor wine, was at one time the only species in the district. It has also been suggested, with great reason, that the Mission was not a pure Vitis vinifera, but a hybrid between V. vinifera and V. girdiana, a wild Californian.
Although the State of California is by far the most important wine-making district in the U.S.A., it is not the only one.
The others are:
1. Finger Lakes There are some eight or ten lakes in west central New York State and on the shores of four of which grape growing has long been an important industry. Lakes Keuka and Canandaigua are the most important, and the chief seats of the industry are at Rheims, Hammondsport and Pennyan on the former lake, and Naples on the latter. In 1830 the Reverend William Bostwick planted a vineyard at Hammondsport using the varieties Isabella and Catawba, and then in 1860 Charles Champlin started up at Rheims, the object of his company being to make brandy and champagne.
2. This was the beginning of the sparkling wine industry of the New World. As for red wines here, at present the best grapes are Ives, Eumelan, Clinton and Clevener, of which the first two make the best wines.
3. Chateauqua Grape Belt This is the second most important region in Eastern America and lies on the south-eastern shore of Lake Erie. It lies along the shore, 50 miles in New York State and then on into Pennsylvania.
The first grapes here were planted in 1818 by Deacon Elijah Fay, but they were the wild foxy-tasting Vitis labrusca, and for wine making they were a failure. In 1822, the Deacon tried again, this time with Miller’s Burgundy, Sweetwater and Black Hamburg, all tender varieties of the European Vitis vinifera, but this was a worse failure. Deacon Fay tried a third time, using Catawba and Isabella and thus the nucleus of a famous vineyard area was born.
1. Hudson River Valley This is the third most important grape growing district in the New York State. Some good wines are made here, but generally speaking it is a table grape area.
2. Niagara This grape area lies along the southern shore of Lake Ontario, a hundred miles from Niagara Falls. In 1868, a cross of Concord seeds fertilized by Cassady produced the cross which was called the Niagara. It was (in 1890) heralded as the perfect all purpose grape and millions of vines were set in vineyards. But taste-wise speaking it was too foxy, and when made into wine was so musky that it was scarcely fit to drink. Now, all the Niagara grape vineyards are dying out.
3. Ohio and Pennsylvania Started in 1818 by a German, Thomas Eichelberger, around York, Pennsylvania. Now, some very good red wines, and a few less good white, are made around Egg Harbour, New Jersey. An early centre of wines was around the town of Cincinnatti in Ohio ; here Nicholas Longworth, one of the richest men in America, introduced the Catawba grape in 1825, and some years later he sent a present of this wine to Longfellow, which inspired his poem Catawba Wine. Longworth constructed his sixty thousand dollar winery as a hobby after he had retired, and his vinification efforts were most successful. When he retired, the district grew less and less wine, though it would seem to be that the climate and soil are still conducive to viticulture.
4. Michigan and Virginia A little wine is made in Michigan. Wine used to be made in Virginia, and in the late seventies and eighties a red wine made by the Monticello Wine Company became quite the rage. Now it has all died out.
Americano
A cocktail consisting of 1/4 Italian bitters, 3/4 sweet Italian vermouth, lemon peel and ice, and topped up with soda water. When it is served 1/3 gin, 1/3 bitters and 1/3 vermouth it is called a Negroni, and usually is served without the soda water.
Amertume
French for bitterness.
Aminian
A favourite Greek wine of ancient times
Ammerschwihr.
A wine producing township (exceptionally badly bombed in World War II) in Alsace (q.v.) near Colmar.
Amontillado
A type of Spanish sherry which is on the dry side and paler than most, though not as pale or as dry as a Fino, and the word is never used by the better sherry houses to denote anything but a fairly high grade wine.
The word gets its name from the village of Montilla (Cordoba province), whose wines it is supposed to resemble.
Amoroso
This is an Oloroso (the word is an invention of Jerez shippers) which has been sweetened to a velvety smoothness.
The literal meaning in Spanish is a lover, a gallant. It was used as such in English until the 17th century.
Amorpfad
German for lovers’ lane. A famous vineyard site at Berncastel on the Moselle.
Amphora
A two handled earthenware vessel of various shapes, but usually oval and with a pointed end at the bottom, used for oil or wine and which was driven into the ground for storing or maturing purposes. The second meaning was that of a liquid measure, with the Greeks about 9 gallons, and the Romans nearly 7 gallons, also called a quadrantal. Wyclif (1382) and of wijn sixe amphoris.
Ampuis
A small town and district of the Rhone, below Lyon, where Cote Rotie is made.
Amsterdam
The home (with Schiedam equally or even more commercially important) of Dutch gin and the centre of their liqueur trade. Probably one of the first places where spirits were distilled.
Anacreon
A Greek lyric poet of the 5th century B.C., who composed many poems in praise of wine and was reputed to be a great drinker. Thus, Anacreontically means in a convivial fashion. He wrote an Ode to Wine which was translated by Abraham Cowley. The historian Valerius Maximus records that he died at an advanced age from a grape pip sticking in his throat.
Anada
Term used in Jerez to denote wines of one vintage maintained without wines of different kinds or other vintages.
Andalucia
Spain’s most southerly province and, her biggest producer in quantity, it is much the most important. Here is made Sherry, Montilla, Manzanilla and Malaga.
Angelica (i)
A heavy, very sweet white grape mixture consisting largely of unfermented grape juice and brandy. On sale in California. Not highly thought of.
Angelica (ii).
A genus of plants much used as the basis of flavouring several famous liqueurs.
Angers
A town of 100,000 inhabitants in the centre of the Anjou-Saumur wine district of the Loire.
Angludet, Chateau
A growth of Cantenac (Medoc), producing 400 hogsheads of red wine annually.
Anina
Famous vineyard area due west of Jerez-de-la-Frontera (Spain).
Anis
In Spain they drink an alcoholic aperitif thus called, flavoured with aniseed. Often it is drunk with water added.
Anisette
An aniseed liqueur drunk in France. Pernod is one example of the style.
Anjou Wines
There are 14,000 vignerons in this district, which produces a small amount of great white wine, a large amount of average quality white, and a great deal of drinkable rose wine.
The most frequently used grape is the Chenin Blanc, or the Pineau Blanche de la Loire. For the rose wines it is the Groslot, which is used for the cheaper wines, and the Cabernet, for the finer ones.
Anjou is the name of an old province in France; most of the above mentioned wines are grown in the departement of the Maine-et-Loire, with the River Loire as the dividing line between the two following types: to the north of the river are made the rose wine and the all purpose whites; to the south are made the (sweeter) really fine wines. This is again divided into three districts :
1. The Coteaux de la Loire,
2. Coteaux de I’Aubance,
3. Coteaux du Layon,
and in this last district are made wines which in good years last as long as the great white Bordeaux and taste nearly as great. To the south of these districts are made the white semi-sweet pleasant wines of Saumur (q.v.), and in the town of this name and Saint-Hilaire-Saint-Florent they are turned into one of the best sparkling wines of France.
Anthracnose
A disease of the vine caused by dampness or fogs which attacks the berries, the leaves and the shoots. It usually appears first on the leaves in small dark brown spots with a black margin.
Then the berries become hard, more or less wrinkled, and the eyes (its other name is bird’s-eye-rot ) burst, showing the seeds, much as in powdery mildew (q.v.). Spraying with bordeaux mixture, as for several fungoid diseases, keeps it in cheek. Rarer in Burgundy.
Aperitif, Aperitiv, Aperitive
Which ever way it is spelt, and all appear equally correct and used, the word comes from the Latin apertivus, meaning tending to open, and has been used in the English language since the 16th century as a medicinal term for an aperient. Alexis Soyer used it thus in 1853. In French, the word aperitif used in its present sense to denote an opening, short, pre-prandial drink is also quite new, for in French dictionaries of around 1845 there is no mention of this sense. Contrary to what is thought, the majority of the biggest selling French aperitifs are not made with wine, as we accept the term wine (the fermented juice of the grape), but with mistelle, which is fresh grape juice to which has been added enough spirit to stop the fermentation. This mistelle is then allowed to get well blended and even matures in huge vats. When the finished aperitif is needed for sale, to this mixture is added an infusion of herbs, etc., and often quinine, the exact components of which are kept a strictly guarded secret.
Appellation Controlee and Appellation d’Origine
For those who do not read this entire article, it can be said that Appellation d’Origine, so far as the quality of a French wine goes, has practically no significance, but the Appellation d’Origine Controlee or Appellation Controlee, both have great practical significance.
The word appellation in English and French means a denomination, a designation, a title given. In France, the laws to protect French vineyards started during the Second Empire 1857 – when certain personal brands were protected, but this was more to protect the owner rather than the public.
In 1908, the first districts of France were, by law, defined : Cognac, Champagne, Armagnac, Banyuls, Clairette de Die.
Then, in 1919 came the first of the Appellation d’Origine laws. Before the final wording was decided upon, a vast number of verbal battles had taken place and the result was that the law was watered down so badly that it was virtually useless. Provided that the makers of a certain wine could, within reason, show that they had been making it for some while according to local customs and that it came from such and such a commune, then the right of the title of origin automatically applied.
As the years passed it became clear that this very law which was designed to protect the quality of French wine was having the opposite effect.
In 1923, the total amount of appellation d’origine wine declared in all France was 5 million hectolitres. In 193 1, it was 10 million, and by 1934 it had passed 15.7 million hectolitres.
What was happening was, according to M. Capus, a Minister of Agriculture, that ‘,straight away in regions where the appellation d’origine applied, people planted thousands of hectares of barley or scrub land with low grade grape species, but big bearers.
These wines benefited from the appellation. It was a disaster! So the better vignerons revolted, and the same Capus (he had been a professor of agriculture in the Gironde), aided by M. Bender, formulated a further law which was passed in July 1927 and was called the Law Capus.
This dotted the i’s of the earlier law and tied up rather loose phrases, but was mainly concerned to see that wines should not have the appellation right unless the grape species and the nature of the soil both conformed to usages local, loyal and constant. The Law Capus further improved matters by making it obligatory when moving or selling appellation controlled wines to send documents to the mairie with the following indications.
1. The geographical origin of the wine
2. The grape species used
3. The amount of wine in question.
Progress was now being made, but it was nothing like enough, and great abuses of the law were still taking place. But in July 1935, there appeared another law which this time had teeth. It should be mentioned that in the meantime M. Capus had become a senateur. At a meeting with Representatives of la Gironde, la Dordogne, Gaillac, les Charentes, la Touraine et Centre-ouest, la Bourgogne, Arbois, Chateauneuf-du-Pape, and I’Alsace, he had propounded new legislation which he proposed to call appellation d’origine controlee So the 1935 law caused to be created the Comite national des appellations d’origine des vins et eaux-de-vie, which started off with:- 6 parliamentarians (2 had to be specialists), 8 representatives of producers, 2 representatives of the National Comite of Propaganda, 2 representatives of wine dealers, 6 civil servants. They started work in May 1936 and in May 1938 they had published 108 decrees on controlled appellations: 13 south-east France and Cotes du Rhone; 11 Anjou Touraine, the west and centre; 38 Bordeaux and south-west; 41 Burgundy and Franche-Comte; 2 Champagne; 3 Cognac and Armagnac. From now on, if a wine had the controlled title right, it had (if sold in bottle) to have Appellation Controlee written in green on the normal label or on a white label in red. For wholesale deliveries, a certificate would accompany it – green for table wines, orange for vins de liqueurs, and golden yellow for eaux-de-vie.
This was not all, for M. Capus and his 1935 law now turned to cultivation and vinification, and to being obliged to plant the correct types of grapes was added the necessity of seeing that the alcoholic degree was sufficient, that the amount of wine made to a hectare was not too much, that the actual vinification and method of cultivating the vineyard conformed to certain standards. It was control indeed. Then, from the point of view of enforcing the law, a difficulty appeared. Some vineyards found that they had a double appellation ; the new controlled one and the old d’origine one. Thus, on 3rd August 1942, by the law and enforcement of the same day, this duality was suppressed, leaving only the controlled one with the maximum guarantees. These now are as follows
1. A geographical area recognised as being suitable of producing the qualified wine, after it has been examined by experts of the national comite and confirmed by local land rights.
2. Grape species authorised by virtue of their use.
3. A minimum alcoholic degree for the wine before any concentration has been carried out.
4. The average rendement (i.e. the amount of wine allowed to be made from a given area) of the land which is in question.
5. The minimum number of vines planted per hectare.
6. The methods of pruning as recognised by local use. See also V.D.Q.S.
Apple Jack
The American name for apple brandy, i.e. distilled cider.
Apre (French).
Harsh. Used to describe a rough, hard wine.
Apricot Brandy, Apricot Liqueur
A drink with a base of brandy flavoured up with apricots. The liqueur will be sweeter and less strong than the apricot brandy.
Apulia
A southern province of Italy, on the Adriatic Sea, given up to wine making from Taranto to Brindisi and up to Bari.
Mainly it is known for its dessert wines, of which the Moscato del Salento is the best. Aleatico wines are made in the regions of Bari, Brindisi, Lecce and Taranto.
Aquavit
Means water of life and is used in Scandinavian countries to denote many spirits.
Aqua-Vitae
A very old English word, never naturalised, used by alchemists and applied to unrectified alcohol. From the Latin, water of life.
Aquitaine
A name originally applied (then called Aquitania) to the area of modern Gascony and then consisting of a number of obscure tribes which were conquered by Caesar’s lieutenant, P. Licinius Crassus.
It came under Roman influence, and then in the Middle Ages was annexed to Britain and then returned to the French royal kingdom at the end of the Hundred Years’ War. Thus, over the centuries, Aquitaine, Gascon, Gironde, Bordeaux and Claret have all, so far as wine is concerned, been synonymous.
Aragon
Province of Northern Spain, with Saragossa as the capital, noted for making a great deal of ordinary wine, plus also a sweet white wine called Carinena.
Araki
See Arrack.
Aramon
One of the lesser red wine grapes from the quality point of view. Greatly used in California, South Africa, Australia, and the lower middle part of France. It gets it name from a canton in the departement of the Gard.
Arbanats
A villagelcommune of 500 inhabitants and 800 hectares, near Podensac and some 15 miles south of Bordeaux. it makes almost equally both red and white Graves, with the legal right to be called Graves and Graves Superieures. The most important vineyard goes by the name of Chateau Tourteau-Chollet (100 hogsheads red and 300 white), followed by Chateau Virelade (100 hogsheads red, 60 white), and Chateau Moron-Lafitte (200 hogsheads red, nil white), owned by Prudent Lafitte, farmer.
Arbois. (Town)
A charming little Jura town of 3,500 souls, situated on the lower part of the Monts Jura, and which has a great reputation for wine.
It has two restaurants which have a star for good food in the Guide Michelin and also a tiny museum which is shown to visitors, where they can see the still and room where Louis Pasteur (q.v.) carried out his most famous experiments which led to pasteurisation.
Although he spent much of his boyhood in Arbois, he was not, as is erroneously stated, born there, but at Dole.
Arbois. (Wines)
People tend to talk of Arbois wines when they really mean Jura wines, in the same erroneous way that they speak of Stein (q.v.) wines when they mean Franconian wines. Du vin d’Arbois, Plus on en boit, Plus on va droit. This slogan (of Arbois wines; the more you drink, the straighter you go), although now used to great effect in propaganda literature and etched on restaurant wine glasses, is very old (probably 1758) and gives some idea of its importance as a wine.
But its reputation goes back to Henry IV. In 1600, he remarried Marie de Medicis in Paris, and that great memoir writer, Sully, the Prime Minister, was charged to give the newlyweds a splendid feast : the Queen was attended by all her Italian ladies, who, being pleased with the wine of Arbois, drank more of it than was necessary.
But near Arbois is the little hamlet of Pupillin where they make excellent wine, though it is usually sold under the name of Arbois. This has caused another jingle : Arbois le nom, Pupillin le bon.
The following communes around Arbois have the right to the name Arbois: Pupillin, Montigny, Mesnay, Villette, Vadans, Les Arsures, Molamboz, Montmalin, Saint-Cyr, Abergementle-Grand, Mathenay, LePlanches.
The permitted grape species are: Reds – Ploussard (called also the Poulsard), Trousseau, Pinot Noir or Pinot Gris; Whites – Savagnin, Chardonnay (also called Melon d’Arbois), Pinot blanc vrai.
Arcins
A tiny commune some 33 km. north of Bordeaux, in the Medoc, making red wines with the legal right to be called Haut Medoc.
Some vineyards: Chateaux Tramon (80 hogsheads annually), La Tour-du-Roc (120 hogsheads), d’Arcins (240 hogsheads), Barreyres (120 hogsheads), Arnaud (80 hogsheads).
Arenas
Spanish for sands. Applied to districts of sandy soil around Jerez which produce twice the amount of wine to the acre as albarizas, but of less good quality.
Argentine Wines
The largest winemaking country of South America and now, with its 250 million gallons annual production, the fifth largest in the world.
Most of it is made in the province of Mendoza, at the foothills of the Andes. Most of it is ordinary and very little is exported. Generally speaking, the name of the grape rather than the district goes on the label.
Argol
A very old English word (Chaucer used it) of unknown origin. The crude cream of tartar (potassium bitartrate) deposited in fermenting vats during fermentation. In some large American wineries, it is an important by-product for the baking powder industry.
Arinto
The name of a dry white wine made near Lisbon, which used to be said to resemble a hock. Rarely exported, Named after a grape of this name.
Aristophanes, 450-385 (?) B.C.
In The Knights wrote several well-known lines in favour of wine.
Aristotle, 384-322 B.C.
Wrote much in favour of wine-drinking.
Armagnac
The greater part of the wine production of the Armagnac Hills is a strong, sharp white wine not much sought after for table purposes. Here, as in the Charente, the wine that is made is produced less for drinking than for distilling, and the process has the sole aim of retaining the volatile essences. The making of Armagnac only partially follows that of Cognac, for in the former area the distilling takes place instantly after the vintage when the wine is still rough, and as the district is so much smaller no blending takes place. Following the harvest, portable stills (the man who works them is called the burner) go travelling around the countryside, trailing around with them an apparatus that looks like a small old-fashioned locomotive.
Distillation is a continuous process controlled to give 9 u.p. (Sykes), and then the spirit goes straight into oak casks made and grown locally. Here perhaps more than anywhere else, it is the art of the cooper and the quality of the wood he selects, that determines the final product. Officially, the Armagnac (a district, not a departement) area is divided into three zones in the following order of precedence :
1. Bas-Armagnac, which is furthest east and has for its business transacting place, the little (3,500 souls) town of Eauze.
2. Tenareze, in the middle, with the town of Condom (6,700 inhabitants) as the centre.
3. Haut-Armagnac. This area surrounds on the north, east and south the Bas-Armagnac and Tenareze, and in the centre is Auch, the headquarters of the whole Armagnac district.
The Armagnac country was the home of the redoubtable d’Artagnan, one of Louis XIV’s. favourite Musketeers, and thus most firms have their Reserve d’Artagnan ; but as (and this is the difference from Cognac) a lot of the trade (a third of Cognac) is in the hands of small peasants, a great deal of fiery Armagnac is dumped on the market. But a good Armagnac can be excellent.
Arnaud de Villeneuve
This is how he has come to be known, though his correct name was Arnaldus Villanova (1238-1314). He was born in Spain, but educated in Sicily, and then taught medicine, alchemy and astrology at Avignon and Montpellier. His was the reputation of being the most erudite man of his generation, and he it is who is reputed to have first made brandy, which he named the elixir of life. Certainly, he introduced its use into the Materia Medica of the day. His work Regimen Sanitas deals with the correct choice of wine and food, and De Vinis gives accurate directions for making several medicinal wines.
Aroma
Another word for bouquet (q.v.).
Arrack
The word in its true Arab form stood for the fermented juice of the date, but the word has extended to most Mohammedan countries and has been adopted by them. Now it means any spirituous liquor of native manufacture, especially that distilled from the fermented sap of the cocoa palm, or from rice and sugar fermented with coconut juice.
Arroba
A Spanish measure used for wines and holding 16.66 litres.
Arrope
This is a Spanish liquid produced by boiling down slowly (15 to 20 hours) grape must to a fifth of its original consistency. Then it is mixed with wine and used for sweetening purposes.
Arsac
A hamlet/commune of the Medoc, 22 kin. north of Bordeaux, whose wines have the legal right to be called Haut-Medoc. It has one vineyard which is famous : Chateau du Tertre, a fifth classified growth making 400 hogsheads annually.
Artimino
A Tuscan (Italy) red claret type wine formerly in demand.
Asciutto (Italian)
Used to denote a sharp dry wine.
Asques
A tiny hamlet/commune in the Fronsac district of Bordeaux where a great deal of (all red) wine is made. Chateau Couffin makes 800 hogsheads annually.
Assmanshausen
Here, made with the Pinot Noir grape (called in Germany the Spatburgunder) are the most famous red wines of Germany. They are situated in the very north of the Rheingau, by the vineyards of Rudesheimer Berg, and behind the famous Nationaldenkmal (Monument) and the Niederwald.
The two best vineyards are Hollenberg and Hinterkirch. But German red wines are never great.
Asti
An important wine-making town in the province of Piedmont (q.v.), Italy. It is a great centre for the Italian (sweet) vermouth trade, and the grape, the Muscat d’Asti, is perhaps the foremost grape of all Italy.
But Asti is usually connected with the great Asti Spumante, or sparkling wine, trade, which first originated in Canelli. The wine is quite sweet.
Athenaeus
With Petronius (q.v.), it is to Athenaeus that we owe most of our knowledge of the wine and food customs of Roman times. He talks of smoky wine, spiced wine, mixed with blood, with fresh water. Its use in cookery ; as used by the Persians. Of honeyed wine. Of taxes paid in wine. Of chilled wine.
Wine-presses –shops, –coolers, –clarifiers, –biscuits, and wine-skins. Of wine as an antidote to sorrow. Bread dipped in wine. Of cabbage as an antidote to wine and of celebrating victories in wine. All this is to be found in The Deipnosophists, or The Sophists at Dinner (also called the Gastronomers) by Athenaeus, who lived at Neucratis in Egypt at the end of the second and the beginning of the third century after Christ.
The subject is a single banquet given by a wealthy Roman named Larensis, and occupies 15 books of about half-a-million words long, published in the Loeb Classics in 7 volumes. At least, that number is left today, though the original work was almost certainly longer still.
Athol Brose
Brose is the same as brewis, and this comes from the Old French brouetz or brouet, a soup with broth or meat.
Yet Brose is a dish made by pouring boiling water on oatmeal, and seasoned with salt and butter. Athol Brose is the same, to which whisky and honey have been added.
Attic Wine
The wines of the province of Attica, which even in classical times were pepped up with resin.
Aubance
The wines of the Aubance hillsides, made along the small river of this same name, are white and quite sweet and are classified as Coteaux de I’Aubance.
A small amount of rose is also made here. Some names to remember are Soulaines, Brissac, Huille, Briolay.
Aube
A departement in north-eastern France, adjoining the champagne vineyard districts, where a great deal of sparkling wine is made.
Aubigny
A minor red winemaking district near Reims.
Auch
A town of some 16,000 inhabitants in the departement of Gers which is one of the centres of the Armagnac brandy trade.
Aude
One of France’s three vast very ordinary wine producing departements in the south. Mostly red.
Auros
A small wine producing hamlet/commune well to the south of Bordeaux in the Bazardais area, making both red and white wines equally, with the right to be called Bordeaux and Bordeaux Superieur.
Aum
This is the modern English variant of Aam (Ama and hama are Latin for a water bucket), a Dutch and German liquid measure, formerly used in England for Rhenish wines. The size of the casks varied from 36 to 50 gallons. The Aum now used contains 30 gallons.
Ausbruch
A better quality Tokay. Ausbruch is German for wine of the first pressing.
Auslese
German for selection. When applied to wine, it means that the grapes have been carefully selected, or picked over, to see that no mouldy bunches go into the press. The designation Auslese is by law limited to unsweetened wines.
Ausone, Chateau
The foremost chateau of Saint Emilion and designated ler Grand Cru. It produces some 100 hogsheads of a much sought after red wine annually. Tradition has it that the Chateau occupies the same site as the splendid villa which Ausonius (q.v.) built at Lucaniac, as Saint Emilion was then called.
Ausonius
Decimus Magnus Ausonius was born in Bordeaux about the beginning of the fourth century A.D. and died circa A.D. 395. For 30 years he taught in his native town, but was distinguished enough to be called by Valentinian to be tutor to Gratian at Trier. Thus it was that he came to write his most famous of many poems, the Mosella, still today a good guide to the river. It describes the fishes that can be caught there and the vines that grow on its banks.
Australia
ยท HISTORY
The first vines were planted in January 1788, when Captain Arthur Phillip arrived with his little fleet of eleven ships from England which he had left in May 1787. A letter from an officer of the fleet written from the Cape in November 1787 states that Captain Phillip had embarked great quantities of livestock, plants, etc., intended for the Settlement and among these plants were vines which were successfully struck at Farm Cove (now the site of the Botanical Gardens), Sydney. Three years later, Phillip (now Governor) had established a 3 acre vineyard and the Australian wine industry had started. In 1801, Napoleon sent out a mission to report on the newly colonised land, and there is one section referring to vines and wine in which M. Peron, the man who made the report, states : In spite of the fact that Britain’s consumption of wine, and on her fleets, is immense, she grows none of it herself. Australia must therefore become the ‘ vineyard of Great Britain ‘.
Captain John McArthur (1767-1834) was the next vine pioneer. He and his two sons, James and William, settled down at Camden Park and turned the place into a full-scale vineyard. William brought out German vignerons from Europe and generally devoted his energies to improving the species used, so that by 1843 the McArthurs were already making wines with the following grapes : Pinot Gris, Frontignac, Gouais (La Folle), Verdelho, Cabernet Sauvignon, Riesling, Grenache, Mataro. Next Geoffrey Blaxland; he made his place among Australia’s pioneer vignerons in two ways:
1. He was the first to pass over the huge natural barrier range west of Sydney, the Blue Mountains, and to explore the fertile plains beyond, which caused the development of wine-making in New South Wales.
2. He shipped the first quarter-pipe of red wine back to England in March 1822, for which he won a Silver Medal from the Royal Society of Arts.
3. But the most important wine pioneer of all, perhaps the father of Australia’s wine industry, was James Busby, to whom a special article is devoted.
AUSTRALIAN WINE DISTRICTS
Although New South Wales was the starting place of Australian wines, this territory has been quite outstripped by South Australia, which now produces annually an average (1945 to 1954) of 22 million gallons. Over this same ten year period, the annual production of New South Wales was 4 million gallons, of Victoria 21 million gallons, West Australia 750,000 gallons and Queensland 40,000 gallons. The wine-making areas within the above-mentioned territories are as follows:
1. South Australia:–
The whole industry is situated in and around Adelaide. Some excellent wine is made adjoining the edge of the Mount Lofty Ranges. Adelaide is the centre of the South Australian trade and vineyards which produce 75 per cent. of the total of the continent’s wines. To the north of the town are the districts of Barossa, Angaston, Clan and Watervale, and immediately south is McClaren Vale, O’Halloran Hill, Reynella and Morphett Vale. The other districts in South Australia are Coonawarra and the Murray Valley.
2. New South Wales:–
The main wine growing districts are those around Sydney which includes those of the Hunter River, and those made 400 miles inland to the south at Corowa and Albury on the River Murray.
3. Victoria:–
Here, the principal area is at Rutherglen, nearly 200 miles north of Melbourne and also on the River Murray. Early vineyards of this state were at Lilydale, Chiltern and Bendigo. Tahbilk and Barnawartha also make delicate beverage wines, while in the Great Western district, near Arrarat they make sparkling wine.
4. West Australia:– All made around Perth.
5. Queensland:– All made around Brisbane and Roma.
Austria
The white wines of Austria are by no means bad; some are good. Two miles to the north of Vienna, overlooking the Danube, are the vineyards of Nussberger, where pleasant, steely, smoky wines are made. Further north again is Klosterneuberg (the home of the Viennese wine school) where some very good wines are made. The wines of Grinzing, by Vienna, are excellent too. To the south of Vienna is Gumpoldskirchen, a show village where the finest wines of Austria are made. Here is the famous Weingut Stift-Melk, one of the most beautifully kept cellars (some parts are over 1,000 years old) in Europe. Although the headquarters of this wine business is in Gumpoldskirchen, the great convent of Melk is 60 miles from Vienna. Lastly, the wines of the Wachau. These are located some 70 miles from Vienna and are made around the lovely old town of Krems. Other wines from here are called after the village of Loiben, of Spitz, and also of Durnstein, one of Austria’s show villages, where Richard Coeur-de-Lion is supposed to have been serenaded by Blondel. Wine grapes used in Austria are: Sylvaner (makes a more scented wine than does the Sylvaner in Alsac ; this grape originated in Austria); Rotgipfler (a grape the Austrians think much of ; makes a firm, steely, powerful wine), Neuberger (another Austrian grape ; makes a full, round wine); Veltliner (Austria’s national grape). Austria makes quite a bit of red wine in the Voslau, a district south of Vienna, on past Gumpoldskirchen. It is not very great.
Auxerre
The chief and prefecture town (26,000 inhabitants) of the departement of the Yonne and the nearest large town to the Chablis vineyards.
Auxey-Duresses
A little village/ commune south of VoInay in the Cotes de Beaune where both red and white burgundies are made. one of the principal cuvees of the famous Hospices de Beaune is made here – Cuvee Boillot.
Avallon
A town of 5,000 inhabitants in the very south of the departement of the Yonne, but in the old province of Burgundy, where some fair red and white wines are made.
Avelsbach
A vineyard/district of some 200 acres on the River Ruwer and opposite the more well-known places of Eitelsbach and Kasel. The best known vineyards are:- Altenberg, Avelsbach, Hammerstein, Herrenberg, Tielslay, Dom-AveIsbach and Dom-Herrenberg. These latter two names are reserved exclusively for the Hohe Domkirche, the Cathedral of Trier, who own some 30 acres of vineyards here. The wines of Avelsbach are steely, dry, slightly acid, but magnificent in great years.
Avenay
A red grape growing (for champagne) village/commune just north of Epernay.
Avensan
A village/commune of the Medoc, 19 miles north of Bordeaux and 2 miles east of Castelnau. The wines are all red. Some chateaux : Villegorge (80 hogsheads annually), Citran-Clauzel (320 hogsheads), d’Avensan (20), Romefort (120), Laudere (60). Also some 80 smaller vineyards making from 80 down to 4 hogsheads annually.
Avignon
The headquarters town (62,000 inhabitants) for Chateauneuf-du-Pape wines, which is some 13 kms. north.
Avize
A commune/village of the champagne district, making one of the finest blanc de blancs. It is due south of Epernay and just above Le Mesnil in the Cote de Blancs. Still white Avize can occasionally be bought which in fine years is excellent.
Ay
A commune/village right on the River Marne and only a mile or so north-west of Epernay, growing red grapes for champagne.
Ayguemorte
A commune/hamlet 20 kms. south of Bordeaux in the Palus area, making red and white wines of average quality with the legal right to be called Graves and Graves Superieures. Some chateaux : Lusseau (160 hogsheads red and 80 white), du Mejan (100 red, 40 white), St. Gerome (160 red, 60 white); plus another 25 small owners who make from 60 down to 4 hogsheads of red and white annually.
Azores
Islands lying north-west of Madeira, which until devastated by the Oidium produced a lot of fair wine.
