This is not a new book published originally in 2003. Patrick McGovern is Scientific Director of the Biomolecular Archaeology Laboratory for Cuisine, Fermented Beverages, and Health at the University of Pennsylvania Museum.
This is short review because there have been many reviews completed of this book when it was published.
First this is a great book to read if you want to peek behind the curtains to understand the antiquity of wine–it’s evidence that McGovern so masterly brings alive through his biomolecular archaeological approach.
So when we talk about wine grape cultivation being around for many millennia we may take those dates for granted or worse suspicious of those dates. But the two methods are to look at the archaeologic evidence of pottery shards (where wine might have been stored) but also looking at art work showing wine and wine grapes being depicted.
Then there is the molecular archaeology–residual material that can be scientifically reviewed to see what that material is and to confirm the presence of wine aided by the aging of the material and/or the vessels where the residue comes from.
The book looks at the entire subject matter and looks at specific regions like the Holy Land, Greece, Egypt, Rome and Anatolia. The book looks at artifacts–clay pots and vessels with wine identified markings–subscribing meaning. Wine in Rome might be for a Bacchanalian delight but they also added Myrrh to the beverage. The book also highlights in some detail about resin in wine and that additives were for perceived beneficial use. Think of myrrh is both sacred and medicinal. Resin wines–and most people would think of Retsina as the wine of historical provenance.
The book talked about how Vitis vinifera L. subsp sylvestris would not have grown in the Middle East and hence it would be the cultivated variety that would: Vitis vinifera subsp. vinifera. Vinifera would have to have been transported to the Middle East for it to develop. Sylvestris would have only been in Eurasian–generally on the boundary of forest hence the desserts of the Middle East could not have supported sylvestris. This all means that Vinifera is about trade and through this it spread the middle east and, of course, does significantly well.
I wish there was a method to track and understand how a variety would be transported historically from one region to the next. This would also explain how varieties evolved as well.
When we think of wine grape cultivation and the evidence of wine being made is at least eight millennia from China to Armenia to Georgia and to Iraq the cradle of cultivation is in the documentation. This book while a great read has some difficult moments in terms of the technical side of it. I think it could have had more diagrams for ease of knowledge on-boarding. It is a good read and you can walk away with the full confidence of our historical heritage of fermentation of wine grapes and that being wine. I am glad I invested the time to read this important subject matter.
If you are interested in history and to get to the ‘heart of the matter’ of how this documentation was assembled and the methodologies utilised – I would certainly recommend this book.
Santé,
James
James the Wine Guy
Demystifying Wine…One Bottle at a Time from all wine regions around the world.
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