Primitivo

The history of the red skin grape Primitivo is ancient and not entirely known as it is lost in the mists of time. Arrived in Puglia in all probability from the other side of the Adriatic sea at the hands of the Illyrians, people of the Balkan region dedicated to the cultivation of the vine since very remote times, began to be marketed throughout the Mediterranean by the ancient Phoenicians who frequented the coasts of southern Italy and in particular those of Puglia. When later the Greeks began to colonize southern Italy from the seventh century. to. C. also brought with them black grape varieties of Asian or Hellenic Hellenic origin which was probably the forerunner of the current Aglianico and which spread especially in Campania and Lucania. No matter how valuable this vine was, it was never planted in Apulia since in the Salento peninsula there was already a black grape variety with an extraordinary taste and great strength. In Roman times the production of southern Puglia acquired great importance, proof of this is that the word “merum” was also used alongside the word “vinum” which generally indicated wines added with water, honey, resins and other additives to make it more syrupy. to indicate the pure, sincere, pure wine that is easy to drink without further sophistication. Thanks to the spread of Roman culture throughout Europe and the East, the word “vinum” entered all Indo-European languages, while the word “merum” remained instead only in the typical Salento dialect where even today good wine is called “mjier “Or” mieru “. Why? Evidently the wine that was already made in Puglia was not “vinum”, but “merum” in the sense of blunt, pure, true; that is good, prized wine. The Primitivo can therefore be considered the most direct heir of the ancient “merum”, the historical wine par excellence of Puglia, the one that first established itself and became famous around Taranto, where the famous Roman poet Horace compared the “merum tarentinum” to the most famous of Roman wines, the Falerno of Campania.

In addition to Orazio in Roman times, Plinio il Vecchio also praised the Salento wines by defining Manduria today the main center of production of this wine, a “viticulosa” city, that is full of vineyards. After the Roman period and the Middle Ages only the Basilian monks in Salento kept the cultivation of the vine alive according to the ancient habits of the local farmers. Finally seeing that the Primitivo di Manduria was a very alcoholic, full-bodied wine with an important color that almost reached the purplish, the French wanted this wine when in 1880, the phylloxera destroyed all the vineyards of Roussillon, the region that provided cutting wine. to all of France. Thus the famous tarantino red wine was not only drunk and consumed on the spot, but resumed the ways of international trade. Finally, in contemporary times, starting in 1974, the year in which the “Primitivo di Manduria” DOC was established and especially since the 2000s, there has been a new renaissance of this great grape with the production of very great red wines that have dominated the most for decades. important world wine competitions. The ampelographic characteristics of the primitive grape are: a medium, pentagonal, five-lobed leaf, the bunch is medium, long, conical-cylindrical, simple, winged or double-winged, medium compact, the berries risukltano of spherical shape and average size and the peel is of medium thickness, bluish and with abundant bloom. The characteristic sensory traits of wines made from primitive grapes are a very intense dark ruby ​​red color. The nose is spicy and fruity. On the palate it is warm, soft, rightly tannic. Of great structure and remarkable persistence.