Since when has there been natural wine? Always!

Since when has there been natural wine? Always!

The earliest examples of "modern" natural wine date back to the late 70s of the 20th century: Long live the Beaujolais! But natural wine has always existed: The so far oldest secured traces of wine are found in the cave "Areni 1" in southeast Armenia

(4,100 BC), where archaeologists were able to uncover a complete wine cellar: Amphora-like containers and other finds prove that all stages of winemaking were carried out there; most importantly, traces of blue color (so-called malvidin: plant pigment belonging to the flavonoids) were found in the amphorae, which is produced only when the pigments are extracted from the skin of blue grapes during fermentation.

However, the wine pressed in this way could not be kept for very long, which is why it was treated with tree resins

(as, for example, later also the Greek Retsina) and other preserving spices added.

At least since the early first millennium before Christ, it was known that sulfur has a preservative character.

has a preservative character and accordingly it was used. But in this

early times, resins or spices were more popular in wine (resin was smeared on the inside of amphorae to seal the open-pored walls), as they gave the wine a special flavor.