Copper Age wine found in Sicily

Angela

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That's 5,000 years ago, two thousand years earlier than previously reported.

See:

http://www.archaeology.org/news/5872-170825-italy-wine-residue

"TAMPA, FLORIDA—The International Business Times reports that traces of wine have been found in an unglazed, 5,000-year-old jar at Monte Kronio, an archaeological site located on the western coast of Sicily, by a team led by Davide Tanasi of the University of South Florida. The residue contained tartaric acid, which is a byproduct of wine fermentation, and a sodium salt connected to tartaric acid. It had been previously thought that winemaking began in Italy some 3,000 years ago, based upon the discovery of grape seeds. The researchers are now trying to determine whether the wine found in the current excavation was red or white."
 
Makes sense.

I had read about traces of white wine found in a 3,300 years old Nuragic Sardinian jar, and of a 2,850 years old wine press found in Sardinia
 
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Later I'll link the article about the 3,300 years old white wine found in Sardinia



The 2,850 years old wine press is the oldest fond yet west of Greece and it's quite elegant:



For what concerns grape vine domestication, archaeologists already had found proof of it both in Peninsular Italy at San Lorenzo and in Sardinia at Sa Osa, where they found hundreds of its seeds stored in wells
 
One of the interesting things about this is that some scholars had posited that wine making came to Italy with Greeks, but perhaps not.
 
Well, clearly this new evidence from Sicily shows that it came to Italy well before the Greeks set foot here.

But the other evidences from Sardinia showed they were making it since at least the late bronze age, one could argue that they started making it thanks to the interaction with Myceneans or Minoans but even that seems far fetched, this new evidence for even earlier wine making from Sicily leads me to think it also developed independently in the rest of Italy.

Add the evidence for grape vine cultivation in early 2nd millennium bc contexts from Central Italy and Sardinia and it's pretty much settled.
 
Well, clearly this new evidence from Sicily shows that it came to Italy well before the Greeks set foot here.

But the other evidences from Sardinia showed they were making it since at least the late bronze age, one could argue that they started making it thanks to the interaction with Myceneans or Minoans but even that seems far fetched, this new evidence for even earlier wine making from Sicily leads me to think it also developed independently in the rest of Italy.

Add the evidence for grape vine cultivation in early 2nd millennium bc contexts from Central Italy and Sardinia and it's pretty much settled.

I don't know, but the process is older than five thousand years.

"The cultivation of the domesticated grape began 6,000–8,000 years ago in the Near East.[1]Yeast, one of the earliest domesticated microorganisms, occurs naturally on the skins of grapes, leading to the discovery of alcoholic drinks such as wine. The earliest archeological evidence for a dominant position of wine-making in human culture dates from 8,000 years ago in Georgia.[2][3][4] "

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grape

It would be interesting to know if this wine was made from the domesticated grape, which would have had to have been brought to or imported into Italy.

Georgia%20Wine.pdf
 
Well, if you're referring to the wine found in Sicily, I don't think we have evidence for cultivated grape in Italy or elsewhere west of Greece in 3000 bc, if you're talking about Sardinia there is evidence of domesticated grapes being cultivated there during the late bronze age e (1286–1115 BC), source:

"Earliest evidence of a primitive cultivar of Vitis vinifera L.during the Bronze Age in Sardinia (Italy)"
 
Wine is thought to have originated in the South Caucasus, between 6000 and 5000 BCE. The oldest known wine-making facility is from 4100 BCE in Armenia, at the time of the Kura-Araxes culture. I have theorised that the Kura-Araxes culture expanded across Anatolia to the Levant and to Greece (with the Minoans), bringing lineages such as J2a1, J1a2-Z1828, T1a-P77, G2a1 (L293), G2a2b1a (M406) and L1b. These lineages were then brought to southern Italy by Greek and Phoenician colonists., who would have brought with them viticulture.

The earliest known wine in Europe was until then from Minoan Greece (oldest vine cultivation from 2000 BCE and oldest known wine-press from 1500 BCE).

This 5000-year-old wine could be an import from Anatolia though.

The previous estimate that vinification started c. 1000 BCE in Italy makes sense as this is roughly when the Greeks started colonising the peninsula (from 900 BCE).
 
I don't know, but the process is older than five thousand years.

"The cultivation of the domesticated grape began 6,000–8,000 years ago in the Near East.[1]Yeast, one of the earliest domesticated microorganisms, occurs naturally on the skins of grapes, leading to the discovery of alcoholic drinks such as wine. The earliest archeological evidence for a dominant position of wine-making in human culture dates from 8,000 years ago in Georgia.[2][3][4] "

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grape

Georgia%20Wine.pdf

Georgia!

This is why I keep getting hits in the various tests back to Georgia!
 
Maciamo is right to urge caution here. Unless the authors of the paper know some facts that didn't make it into the science reporting, the presence of wine in an amphora might just indicate the importing of wine, not the making of it.
 
What amphora are you talking about?

From what I can tell, the residue was found inside these jars. The term is incorrect, as it's only one type of pithos.

See:
148860-web.jpg


They look something like the Minoan pithos, yes?
exp_archeology2_576_500_s.jpg


This is labeled Minoan wine press and container:
Minoan wine press and container.jpg

The Sicilian ones with the residue seem to have a narrower bottom, like amphorae, but the top seems awfully wide for transport.

I would think they'd have to source the clay, at least, to say the wine was produced locally and not imported.
 
Archaeologists can probably tell apart Sicilian pottery from contemporary Cretan one very easily, though as I can see from your pictures there might be some Aegean influence in Sicilian pottery due to trade between those regions.

And in my opinion it would be a stretch to call Cretans from 3000 bc "Minoans" because much of the features the Minoans are known for: their frescos, their monumental palaces, their mysterious script and their hegemony over the sea manifested at least a millennium after 3000 bc
 

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