Sicilian Reds

Sicily: A BRIEF 8000-year-old history

How does one synthesize eight-thousand years of wine culture in one paragraph? Sicily is truly one of the most interesting wine regions. Few other winemaking zones encapsulate both the gravitas of ancient viticulture and the status of a trendy, cutting-edge wine region. In many ways, wines from Sicily taste different and exciting, offering a myriad of ancient native grapes made in both mainstream and innovative wine styles. Although I am not sure I could ever answer this question, if I had to list my favorite wine region, Sicily would be, without a doubt, a top contender.

Sicily's fertile land, sun-filled climate, and strategic position in the Mediterranean made the Island attractive fodder for invaders and conquerors over the centuries. Successfully invaded by Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, Vandals, Goths, Byzantines, Moors, Normans, Germans, French, Spaniards, Austrians, and Northern Italians, Sicilian culture has had countless influences. Despite all of this, Sicilians have been the protagonists and carved out their own place in wine history. For the sake of expediency, I will focus on the events that had the most significant impact on Sicily's viticultural development. Although there is some evidence that winemaking predates Sicily's colonization by the Greeks, there is little doubt that the Phoenician and the Greek arrivals in the eighth century BCE was pivotal. The Greeks brought an established wine culture and its ensuing know-how to the Island. Sicily loomed large in Ancient Greek consciousness as fertile and untamed land. Homer referenced this view in the Odyssey; upon Odysseus's approach of the shadow of Sicily's Mt Etna, he stated:

At last our ships approached the Cyclops' coast.
That race is arrogant: they have no laws;
And trusting in the never-dying gods,
Their hands plant nothing and they ply no plows.
The Cyclops do no need to sow their seeds;
For them all things, untouched, spring up: from wheat

From these lines, one can see how the Greeks viewed Sicily, fertile land with an ignorant and undeserving population that was begging to be conquered and civilized. Unfortunately, this view was carried over by the many invaders that followed. Setting aside the colonizing Greeks' arrogance, they did bring the experience and knowledge of vine training and winemaking to Sicily and southern Italy along with many grape varietals.

By the time the Romans took over at the beginning of the second century BCE, Sicily had become the 'breadbasket' of the Roman Empire. According to mythology, the Roman goddess of agriculture and grain, Ceres, settled in Sicily. The Romans established large farms, known as latifundia, which were managed by wealthy absentee landowners and worked by peasants and enslaved people. Upon the Roman Empire's demise, the latifundia were taken over by the Catholic Church and operated by a baron class that wielded immense power, establishing a feudal system that suffocated economic development for centuries.

After the collapse of the Roman Empire and subsequent barbarian invasions, Sicily came under Moorish control in the seventh century CE and remained so for around two- hundred years. The period of Moorish dominance in Sicily was one of advances and development. From an agricultural perspective, the Islamic fiscal administration, based on the systems employed in Libya and Tunisia, imposed a fixed-rate annual land tax that landowners had to pay regardless of yield. Portions of the revenue from the land taxes were used to make land grants of small farms to soldiers, creating a broad base of free landholders. Laws of inheritance further fragmented these holdings, encouraging better efficiency, productivity, and quality. The Moors also brought advanced knowledge of irrigation, which helped create agricultural biodiversity with gardens brimming with lemons, oranges, melons, apples, pomegranates, pears, pistachios, almonds, mangos, bananas, coconuts, and of course, grapes.

Eventually, internal strife led to the Moors' demise with the Normans conquest of the Island in the eleventh century. The Normans maintained the Moors' existing small farms while establishing more extensive landholdings for a ruling class. However, unlike the centuries to come, the new barons' land grants did not convey inheritance rights. Because the Normans employed a professional army, the Norman rulers were less dependent on the new feudal system, effectively weakening the baron class. Thus, power was more centralized from the Norman Palace in Palermo, steering economic and political policy more cohesively. Under the Normans, agricultural commerce thrived, and small farmers were allowed to continue cultivating their land. Sicily was a garden of paradise under Norman rule and an economic juggernaut; Palermo’s revenue under Roger II was greater than England's entire revenue under the first Norman King, William the Conqueror.

Unfortunately, after the fall of Norman rule, the Sicilian noble class grew in size and influence. Mercenaries and errant noblemen from Continental Europe descended on the Island to stake their claim. Awarded high-value land holdings, there was little interest given to the administration of economic and political policy. Sicily fell into a period of economic malaise and decline. To exacerbate the situation, the barons fought to maintain their privileges as feudal lords, most notably the right to justice and taxation, without honoring the military duties historically associated with feudal structures. Poverty became rife because this system forced tenant farmers to pay onerous taxes. There is one bright spot emerging from this era that is interesting in terms of Sicilian wine today. In the seventeenth century, land reform had the potential to spur an agricultural renaissance in Sicily called enfiteusi. This reform issued long-term land leases of up to 20 years to tenants for their homes and farming. The tenant also had the legal right to prepay the lease's balance, effectively buying the land. Enfiteusi is derived from the Greek word emphyteusis, meaning "to plant and graft," with the thought that with long-term holdings, farmers would plant and then graft the crops that do best the following harvest. This method fosters careful cultivation of grapes, olives, and fruit trees and allows for crop rotation. Interestingly, these reforms were centered around Vittoria and Mt Etna, two synonymous areas with specific indigenous Sicilian grapes. Unfortunately, the reform was short-lived and never took hold on the rest of the Island.

This quick overview reveals Sicily's rich heritage and history. From the eighteenth century to the end of the Second World War, little was done to rectify Sicily's entrenched power structures and economic underdevelopment, leading to the modern-day stereotype of poverty and mafia-influence. Like the rest of Italy, Sicily's viticultural renaissance over the past 30 years has allowed the Island to harness its past to make some of the most exciting wines on the market today.

Caruso e Minini, Perricone “Terre Siciliane”, 2018