Wine vessels found in Kura Araxes site dated to 3,000 BC

Angela

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Well, in addition to being metallurgists it seems these people were involved in the early production of wine. The site is in what is now Georgia.

http://www.archaeology.org/news/4592-160622-georgia-wine-vessel

"VENICE, ITALY—Evidence of wine has been discovered in a vessel unearthed at Aradetis Orgora, a site in Georgia associated with the Kura-Araxes culture, by a team of archaeologists from Ca’Foscari University in Venice and the Georgian National Museum in Tbilisi. The Mirror reports that the animal-shaped vessel, which dates to around 3000 B.C., is missing its head, but still has three small feet and a hole on its back. It was unearthed near a similar vessel and a jar on the burned floor of a building thought to have been used for cultic activities. Palynologist Eliso Kvavadze found well-preserved pollen grains of Vitis vinifera, or common grape vine, in the vessel. The team suggests that the wine was poured out as offerings to the gods or as memorials for the dead."

Of course, wine making in Georgia goes back even further if I remember correctly.

Geogria02.jpg
 
The Areni-1 winery is a 6100-year-old winery that was discovered in 2007 in the Areni-1 cave complex in the village of Areni in the Vayots Dzorprovince of the Republic of Armenia by a team of Armenian and Irish archaeologists.
The winery consists of fermentation vats, a wine press, storage jars, pottery sherds, and is believed to be at least a thousand years older than the winery unearthed in the West Bank in 1963, which is the second oldest currently known.[1][2][3]

that is where the Y-DNA L1a was found.
 
Wow, Neolithic Armenians L1a first winemakers. Well, at least till we find anything older, they should keep the title.
 
wine to the dead we drop even today,
the old custom was to wash the dead with wine, and drop a bottle over his body before the close of the coffin
today only the last is kept, and wine must not preservatives,
it is immoral to drop wine with preservatives to a dead, a bad thing, a curse
it helps to rot the body faster, pure wine is full of bacteria

comes from antique, even the bones after the excavation of the dead are washed with wine, cause has a small acidity.
 
wine to the dead we drop even today,
the old custom was to wash the dead with wine, and drop a bottle over his body before the close of the coffin
today only the last is kept, and wine must not preservatives,
it is immoral to drop wine with preservatives to a dead, a bad thing, a curse
it helps to rot the body faster, pure wine is full of bacteria

comes from antique, even the bones after the excavation of the dead are washed with wine, cause has a small acidity.
Is it wine? From watching "My fat Greek wedding" I thought it was Windex. ;)
 
Is it wine? From watching "My fat Greek wedding" I thought it was Windex. ;)

BRILLIANT, Le Brok! :grin:

@Yetos,
Seriously, if it wasn't wine it was olive oil plus a few herbs. That took care of all ills, according to our old people. Oh, that and pork meat. My great aunt used to say that prosciutto could raise the dead. :LOL:

Once you were indeed dead it was again wine to wash the body and olive oil used to anoint them.

Oh, and if you wanted to know who was putting the evil eye on you, a few drops of olive oil in a bowl of water would tell you.

In getting a picture for the original post I ran across this description of an ancient wine making technique in Georgia where huge clay amphora holding grape products are buried in the ground to ferment .

http://www.eurasianet.org/node/64246

" It can take more than three months for him to shape the brown, doughy clay by hand into a kvevri form. It takes a week for the kvevris then to bake in the 1,000-degree Celsius heat of a large, brick kiln, fueled by firewood. Local kvevri winemakers take the completed amphoras, lined with beeswax, and bury them neck-deep into the ground to receive grape juice, stomped out of grapes by foot. A mixture of grape stems, skins and seeds is next added to the juice to macerate, giving the kvevri wine an intense color and distinct, husky flavor. “The advantage of kvevri-made wine, when made in full compliance with the procedure, is that it is completely natural,” commented Giorgi Tevzadze, chairman of Georgia’s newly formed Kvevri Foundation. “The wine is kept in the stable coolness of the earth and is filtered by relocating it from one kvevri into another.” Buried kvevris are found all over Georgia, including in the ruins of an ancient monastery and a 12th-century academy where viticulture and winemaking were taught. The Georgian practice of making kvevris – and wine itself -- has been traced back as far as 8,000 years, but, in Soviet times, when mass production became the order of the day, factory-made containers eventually nudged the terra-cotta amphoras out of fashion. Today, as Georgia ventures, slowly but surely, into the viciously competitive global wine market, it’s looking at the kvevri (also sometimes spelled “qvevri”) as something to give it an edge over the European, American and Australian wines to which western palates are accustomed. "

From another site:
http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/06/08/412039092/georgias-giant-clay-pots-hold-an-8-000-year-old-secret-to-great-wine

"Bitarishvili says making white wine in qvevri imparts a unique flavor. He pours organic white Chinuri grapes, skins and stems into the qvevri in October each year, lets them ferment with natural yeast for two weeks, and then seals the qvevri and leaves them buried underground for six months before lifting the lids in April. Finally, Bitarishvili transfers the wine to a smaller set of qvevri for a further half year of aging before bottling. There are no barrels, tanks or gauges — just the grapes and the qvevri.In most commercial winemaking, only red wines are fermented with their skins. The extended skin contact gives Bitarishvili's white qvevri wine an orange tint and a deep tannin flavor that is prized by customers in Japan, Europe and the United States. Redqvevri wine is made through the same process."
.

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production-process-of-kveri-vessels-shown-at-kvevri-wine-museum-in-F6Y4PA.jpg


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A more commercial operation:
http://image.shutterstock.com/displ...round-in-kakheti-region-georgia-181862042.jpg

Some Italian vintners are devoting some of their grapes to this method.

I'd love to taste it.



 

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