What Was the Brith of Wine?
Maybe the better question is—what was the birth of civilization? Marat Yanki of Vinkara Winery in Turkey may have said it best. He said that even nomads can cultivate wheat for a season. But that doesn’t mean they’re a tribe or a society. They simply go where the wind blows and plant wheat somewhere new the next year.
A deeper level of civilization happens when a community sets down roots, vine roots. That’s the key. That’s when things start to change. City Vino recently offered a class on Eastern European wines and wine regions, and boy, did that open a floodgate of questions. This blog won’t capture the full scope of that topic, it could fill novels, but let’s touch on a few highlights. Alcohol exists naturally. Rotting fruit ferments all by itself, especially in tropical environments. And let’s be honest, it makes us happy. Even animals like monkeys seek out overripe fruit. Why? Because it makes them feel good. Fruit has sugar. We like sugar. So, we eat fruit.
Professor Robert Dudley from the University of Berkeley came up with what he calls the Drunken Monkey Hypothesis. He started by asking where alcohol actually comes from. Turns out, yeast spores are floating around everywhere in the air. When a vine pushes out leaves and flowers, those yeast spores land on the flower's tissues and get encapsulated as the bloom develops. Once the flower is pollinated, a berry forms, and the yeast is already inside it. As the fruit ripens and gains sugar, the yeast eventually “wakes up” and begins converting sugar into alcohol.
In the tropics, Dudley suggests monkeys intentionally forage and select ripe fruit seeking that natural reward. Fast forward a few thousand years, and now an upright monkey, you know, the modern human, wanders through the grocery store aisle, instinctively selecting a bottle of wine for date night. Evolution!
But let’s pivot to China for a minute. Stay with me here, it all connects. In the Henan Province, there’s evidence of wine in the Neolithic settlement of Jiahu. A vessel from around 5400 BC was found still holding chemical residues that matched rice wine, grape wine, grape tannins, herbs (both ancient and modern), and hawthorn fruit. Was it deliberately mixed? Who knows for sure? But what we do know is that these people were likely nomads, not settled in one place for long. But they had an idea.
It wasn’t until humans figured out a bit of agriculture that the real seeds of civilization were planted, literally. Wheat and barley were key. Then comes Egypt, where grain mash was fermented into beer. And this is also where bread entered the diet. People were finally in one place long enough to store food for leaner months instead of constantly foraging for the next meal. Still, even at this stage, they weren’t necessarily tied to one location year-round. Wheat and barley were often planted for a season and then relocated to better conditions elsewhere the following year.
But wine—real wine—takes us to a place where civilization truly took root. That place is the triangle region of Transcaucasia, which encompasses eastern Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and northern Iran. Somewhere within that triangle is the true birthplace of wine. To put this in perspective, Noah’s Ark supposedly landed on Mount Ararat, which is on the eastern edge of Turkey—smack in the middle of that triangle. Georgia claims to be the first wine-producing country, pointing to their ancient qvevri winemaking technology. Armenia makes a strong case too, with archaeological evidence of a 6,000-year-old winery discovered in a cave.
Either way, the strongest evidence and purest forms of Vitis vinifera—the species of grapevine responsible for all fine wine—come from this region. This matters because here you find grape varieties that are the “big daddies,” the ancestral vines that spawned centuries of mutations, cultivars, and clones.
Why is that important? And how does this tie back to the birth of civilization?
Well—do you know how long a grapevine lives?
It takes about five years from planting for a vine to produce fruit suitable for making decent wine. Another 15 years for it to start producing fabulous wine. And Grand Cru-level fruit? That can take 70 to 80 years of deep-rooted growth to produce the kind of concentrated flavors that define greatness.
That’s generations of time. So, if a community planted vines, they weren’t planning just for themselves. They were investing in the future—for their children, and their children’s children. That means they had to figure out how to feed themselves in the meantime. And they likely formed relationships with neighboring groups to barter and trade while waiting patiently for that perfect grape to grow, be picked, fermented, aged in barrel, and finally—enjoyed. Now that is the start of civilization.
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