Literature

The literature about wine and viticulture is at least as diverse and extensive as the wines of this world. Wine is a central theme and is often mentioned in the Old Testament of the Bible as well as in older works. Viticulture and wine culture at a professional level existed at least 6,000 to perhaps 8,000 years ago in antiquity. The origin of the cultivated grapevine or viticulture lies in the Fertile Crescent, Mesopotamia, in Transcaucasia (Georgia) and in Southeast Anatolia in Turkey. Even then, wine was already being written about, but this cannot yet be called wine literature. The oldest witness of Greek wine culture is Homer, who poetically reports on viticulture and wine enjoyment in his works Iliad and Odyssey around 730 BC. Many other ancient authors wrote on the subject. These included Hesiod (~750-680 BC), Anacreon (~580-495 BC), Socrates (470-399 BC), Xenophon (430-354 BC), Aristophanes (450-380 BC), Aristotle (384-322 BC), and Strabo (63 BC-28 AD). The physicians Hippocrates (460-377 BC) and Galen (129-216) dealt intensively with the health aspects of wine enjoyment. The Carthaginian Mago, who came from a completely different cultural background and lived around 400 BC, wrote extensively about the viticulture practices of the Phoenicians. Although his works have not survived, he is frequently cited by later, especially Roman authors. The literature reached its peak in Roman antiquity in the 1st century AD with many publications on agriculture, including viticulture. However, only a few of these have survived and are only available in fragments in the form of copies or reprints. Some Roman authors can certainly be considered specialists, the most important being Cato the Elder (234-149 BC), Varro (116-27 BC), Virgil (70-19 BC), Columella (1st century), Pliny the Elder (23-79) and Palladius (4th century). The poets Horace (65-8 BC), Ovid (43 BC to 8 AD), and Seneca (1-65) also celebrated wine in the form of lyric, essay, or satire. The work Satyricon contains enlightening information about the eating and drinking culture of the Roman upper class in the 1st century AD. After the decline of the Roman Empire and the subsequent turmoil of the migrations, there was a decline in viticulture and thus also in the literature about it. It was not until around 900 AD that viticulture and related writings regained significance through the achievements of the orders of the Benedictines and later Cistercians. The agricultural compilation Geoponika, created in the 10th century, refers to some ancient wine authors of the Greeks and Romans. Among the most famous wine authors from the late Middle Ages to the beginning of the modern era are Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179), Petrus de Crescentiis (1230-1320), Arnaldus de Villanova (1240-1311), and Johann Rasch (1540-1612) with his "Wine Book: On the Cultivation, Care, and Use of Wine." One of the most comprehensive works on wine comes from the Italian physician, philosopher, naturalist, and writer Andrea Bacci (1524-1600). His main work, first published in Latin in 1596, "De Naturali Vinorum Historia de Vinis Italiae," is divided into seven books or parts. The topics include ancient wine culture, wine production, the influence of the soil on the grapevine and wine, grape varieties, avoidance of wine faults, wine as medicine against many diseases, and wine enjoyment (e.g., optimal wine temperature) and negative effects of intoxication, as well as a detailed description of the wines of Italy, but also from Germany, France, and Spain. From the beginning of the 17th century, many authors began to deal with the subject in a scientific manner. The naturalist Philipp Jakob Sachs von Löwenheim (1627-1672) founded the oldest medical and natural science journal in the world in 1670. In his treatise on the vine, he established the term ampelography. The theoretical considerations on viticulture and wine production by Balthasar Sprenger (1724-1791) are already scientifically grounded and supported by practical experiments. His three-volume book with 2,300 pages on viticulture techniques and characterization of grape varieties is considered a standard work. From this time, there was a diversification of wine literature. For the first time, alongside the classical topics of vineyard care, grape variety knowledge, and wine production or cellar techniques, special topics such as tasting and qualitative assessment of wines with corresponding vocabulary or "Which wine goes with which food" as well as publications on wine-growing regions and their wines were addressed. In this context, the writing guild of wine critics and their wine guides, which gained increasing importance, emerged. The following lists the most well-known wine authors from antiquity to modern times, about whom there is a contribution in this wine lexicon. Biographies often address the drinking culture or drinking habits of prominent individuals and mention their alcoholic preferences or favorite wines. The following list includes around 200 authors, journalists, publicists, and wine critics arranged alphabetically. Either they have published noteworthy treatises on the subject of wine and viticulture in some form or simply "only" - like the first mentioned Alcaeus with "In vino veritas" - made a significant statement about wine. The list is also a "Who is Who" of wine literature. Alcaeus - ancient Greece Gerhardt Erich Alleweldt - Germany Hans Ambrosi - Germany Maynard Amerine - USA Anacreon - ancient Greece Burton Anderson - USA/Italy Kym Anderson - Australia Aristophanes - ancient Greece Arnaldus de Villanova - Spain Claude Arnoux - France Athenaeus - ancient Greece Tim Atkin - England Ausonius - ancient Rome August Wilhelm Babo - Austria Lambert Joseph Leopold von Babo - Austria Andrea Bacci - Italy Friedrich Bassermann-Jordan - Germany Caspar Bauhin - Switzerland Johannes Bauhin - Switzerland Erwin Baur - Germany Helmut Becker - Germany Norbert Becker - Germany Nicolas Belfrage - England Adrien Berget - France Michel Bettane - France Adolph Blankenhorn - Germany Hieronymus Bock - Germany Guy Bonnefoit - France Paula Bosch - Germany Denis Boubals - France Romeo Bragato - Dalmatia/Australia Hans Breider - Germany Pierre Brejoux - France Michael Broadbent - England James Busby - Scotland/Australia Tom Cannavan - Scotland Alain Carbonneau - France Antonio Carpenè - Italy Daniele Cernilli - Italy Jean-Antoine Chaptal - France Cato the Elder - ancient Rome Cato the Younger - ancient Rome Adhémar de Chaunac - France/USA Jules Chauvet - France Oz Clarke - England Charles Cocks - England Columella - ancient Rome Lorenzo Corino - Italy Auguste Courtiller - France William Vere Cruess - USA Giovanni Dalmasso - Italy Hans Denk - Austria August Dern - Germany Thierry Desseauve - France Armin Diel - Germany Horst Dohm - Germany André Dominé - Germany/France Immanuel Dornfeld - Germany Jean Jacques Dufour - Switzerland/USA Hubrecht Duijker - Netherlands Patrick Dussert-Gerber - France Dagmar Ehrlich - Germany Francisc Eiximenis - Spain Sebastian Englerth - Germany Len Evans - Australia Wolfgang Faßbender - Germany Michel-Édouard Féret - France Gustave-Louis-Emile Foëx - France René Gabriel - Switzerland Galen - ancient Greece Pierre Galet - France Heinrich Gall - Germany Josef Glatt - Austria Johann Georg Gmelin - Germany Leopold Gmelin - Germany Hermann Goethe - Germany Rudolf Goethe - Germany Karl Friedrich Gok - Germany Hippolytus Guarinoni - Austria Jules Guyot - France James Halliday - Australia Béla Hamvas - Hungary Agoston Haraszthy - Hungary/USA Julia Harding - England Wilhelm Hauff - Germany Steve Heimoff - USA Alexander Henderson - England Henri d’Andeli - France Herodotus - ancient Greece Gabriel Alonso de Herrera - Spain Marcus Hofschuster - Germany Robert Hogg - England Karl Hohenlohe - Austria Horace - ancient Rome Bernhard Husfeld - Germany Hermann Jaeger - USA Thomas Jefferson - USA Hugh Johnson - England André Jullien - France Odette Kahn - France Helmut Knall - Austria Rudolf Knoll - Germany Franz Kober - Austria Hans-Jörg Koch - Germany Vilém Kraus – Czech Republic Walter Kutscher - Austria Monica Larner - USA/Italy James Laube - USA Jules (Jean) Lavalle - France Alexis Lichine - Russia/USA Carl von Linné - Sweden Egon Mark - Austria Peter Liem - USA Edmund Mach - Austria Mago - ancient Carthage Karl Mader - Switzerland/Italy Josef Mader - Austria/Germany Luigi Manzoni - Italy Campbell Mattinson - Australia Debra Meiburg - USA/Hong Kong Charles Metcalfe - England Johann Metzger - Germany Peter Morio - Germany Laurenz Moser - Austria Karl Müller - Germany Hermann Müller-Thurgau - Switzerland Thomas Volnay Munson - USA Alexandre Pierre Odart - France Jeremy Oliver - Australia Harold P. Olmo - USA Ovid - ancient Rome Palladius - ancient Rome Robert M. Parker jr. - USA Louis Pasteur - France José Peñin - Spain Edmund Penning-Rowsell - England David Peppercorn - England Samuel Pepys - England Abraham Isak Perold - South Africa Lisa Perrotti-Brown - USA/Singapore Carlo Petrini - Italy Petrus de Crescentiis (Piero de Crescenzi) - Italy Émile Peynaud - France Stuart Pigott - England René Pijassou - France Alberto Piròvano - Italy Jules Émile Planchon - France John Platter - South Africa Pliny the Elder - ancient Rome Pliny the Younger - ancient Rome Karl Portele - Austria Frank J. Prial - USA Jens Priewe - Germany Michael Prónay - Austria Victor Pulliat - France Johann Rasch - Austria Emerich Ráthay - Austria Renato Ratti - Italy Cyril Ray - England Hans Rebelein - Germany Cyrus Redding - England Ferdinand Regner - Austria Michael Reinartz - Austria Pascal Ribéreau-Gayon - France Georg-Franz Richter - France Charles Valentine Riley - USA Jancis Robinson - England Leonhard Roesler - Austria Gábor Rohály - Hungary Giuseppe di Rovasenda - Italy Philipp Jakob Sachs von Löwenheim – Germany George Saintsbury - England John U. Salvi - England Otto Sartorius – Germany Franz Josef Schams – Austria Georg Scheu – Germany Mario Scheuermann – Germany David Schildknecht – USA Renate Schoene – Germany Frank Schoonmaker – USA Wenzel Seifert – Austria Nelson Shaulis – USA Viktor Siegl – Austria André Simon – France/England Simon de Rojas Clemente y Rubio – Spain Christian Single – Germany Richard Smart – Australia Carsten M. Stammen – Germany Giovanni Vettorio Soderini – Italy Balthasar Sprenger – Germany Steven Spurrier – England Rudolf Steurer – Austria Tom Stevenson – England Strabo (Strabon) - ancient Greece James Suckling – USA Eckhard Supp – Germany Serena Sutcliffe – England Tacitus - ancient Rome Theophrastus - ancient Greece Wolfgang Thomann - Germany Norbert Franz-Josef Tischelmayer - Austria Franz Xaver Trummer - Austria Giuseppe Vaccarini - Italy Pamela Vandyke Price - England Varro - ancient Rome Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov - Russia Gary Vaynerchuk - Belarus/USA Venantius Fortunatus - ancient Rome Victor Vermorel - France Luigi Veronelli - Italy Pierre Viala - France Joseph Vidal - France Henry Vizetelly - England José F. Vouillamoz - Switzerland As a valuable and fruitful source for the biographies of numerous personalities, the documentation "Personalities of Wine Culture - Short Biographies from 16 Centuries" (Writings on Wine History No. 140, Wiesbaden 2002) by Paul Claus and colleagues was used with kind permission from the Society for the History of Wine e.V. The website contains a free bibliography on the history and culture of wine with around 30,000 recorded works on wine. See also under Wine Personalities and Wine Critics. The lexicon comprises around 6,000 A4 pages, including images and graphics, which is approximately the scope and content of these wine books. These were also used as a source (see also under Wine Lexicon). Writing pen: by Bruno/Germany on Pixabay, ancient books: by Gerhard G. on Pixabay, wine books: by Norbert F. J. Tischelmayer.