Village (Vineyard)

Wine has been a big part of western civilisations for thousands of years. The growing and fermenting of grapes began as early 7000BC in what is now the Caucasus. However, much of modern wine culture derives from the practices of the ancient Greeks. To the ancient peoples wine was not so much a pastime as a religion: the goddess Geshtinana in Egypt, Bacchus in Rome and Dionysus in Greece all looked over the produce of the fermented grape. Wherever the Romans conquered they also traded, settled and drank, which accounts for the great spread of viticulture throughout the empire years and the establishment of the major wine regions and grape varieties we know today. However the ancients would have thought us barbaric for drinking wine undiluted; a civilised culture always mixed at least one part wine to two parts water.