HISTORY OF WINE IN TURKEY

Wine is dance, it is music , joy, festival.
Wine is ritual. It is the holy drink to dedicate to Gods.
Wine is equality; it is family, an opportunity for people to get together.
Wine is civilization;' wine is the most civilized thing in the world 'quoted Hemingway
Wine is philosophy.' There is much more philosophy in a bottle of wine than in a book.' As quoted Louis Pasteur.
Wine is democracy. It can be consumed as easily consumed by women as men.
Wine is poetry in a bottle.

Above are only a few reasons why wine played a significant role in human civilization. The history of wine is almost as old as that of mankind because of the fact that it was made naturally without the contribution of man.
The so-called ' European grape ' ,Vitis vinifera , originated not in Europe but in the Black Sea region, in Caucasia, and in Anatolia ( Asian part of Turkey.) almost 9000 years ago and spread from there to south to the Middle East so that grapevines were being cultivated in Mesopotamia which corresponds in our day to the lands between Euphrates and Tigris Rivers in Turkey, Syria and in Iraq. The vinifera grape then spread east to Phoenicia and Egypt, and by around 2000 B.C Phoenician sailors were ferrying grapevines across the Mediterranean Sea to Greece and beyond.
As revealed by archaeological findings, in Alacahoyuk in Central Turkey, a settlement of early Bronze Age wine cups made of gold were used by the rulers during the religious ceremonies and they were also considered as burial gifts as early as 2500 B.C.Many of these items are exhibited today in the museum of Anatolian Civilizations in Ankara.

WINE AND HITTITES

The Hittites, the most ancient of Indo-European tribes that we know thanks to the written sources, must have come into contact with grape and wine in Anatolia. Very close version of Hittite word wiyana- which corresponds to grape and wine, can be found in European languages ; vinum in Latin , vin in French , wein in German and wine in English. In Hittite hieroglyph, we fain a special character attributed to wine and grape. There are also a number of decrees concerning and determining the ownership system in Hittite Laws. From here we see that viniculture played an important role in Hittite economy.

Wine was offered to Gods in Hittite religious ceremonies. For these offerings different and beautiful style of cups were used. An official called cupbearer is frequently mentioned in the texts concerning the festival rituals. In Hittite language this person was called 'Sagi'. In Turkish today we have the word 'saki' for the person who offers drink.
In recent archaeological excavations conducted at Konya-Karahoyuk (Central Turkey) grape seeds and grapevine-shaped clay pots dating back to Hittite Kingdom period (1700 B.C) have been discovered. Again in Hittite period of 1700-1200 B.C Turkey was called 'Wiyanawanda '- land of grapevine- to emphasize the abundance of grape in this country.

JOURNEY OF WINE AFTER HITTITE EMPIRE

We learn from Assyrians who established a powerful kingdom in Northern Mesopotamia between 9th-7th centuries B.C that, there were more than 10 different quality wines produced in the region. King Sargon the 2nd also tells us in his diaries about the presence of beautiful vineyards and cellars founded by Urartians in Eastern Turkey around the Lake of Van.

After the collapse of Hittite Empire the journey of wine continued with the Phrygians who were local people of Anatolia and it was introduced to Greeks when these conquered western Turkey in order to establish trade colonies. Greeks played an important role specially in trading wine by carrying it to different places across the Mediterranean Sea until France and Italy. One of the grapes introduced to Europe was Misket, from Turkish origin, became called Muscat by Europeans. Again in Greek period some regions in Western Anatolia appeared as the new centers for producing and trading wines. One of these was Tabae ( Tavas-near Pamukkale today) , another one was Klazomenai on the Aegean Coast in 6th and 5th centuries B.C, ( Today's Urla),Ainos ( Enez ) in Northern Aegean region .Knidos , on the South-western shore of Turkey was also the leading center for the wine trade together with the Island of Rhodes . Besides these centers which attracted attention with both the quality and volume of wine trade and production , some islands on Aegean Sea like Chios, Lesvos and Kos also gained importance.

Teos near Izmir is the ancient city where we can find the remains of the biggest temple of Dionysos ( or Bacchus- God of wine ) in the world constructed in Hellenistic period in 3rd century B.C.
It is also said that Phoceans - people of Aegean Turkey - when they traveled across the Mediterranean to found the harbor city of Marseilles in Southern France took also some species of grapevine perhaps Cabernet Sauvignon or Pinot Noir to this country for the first time. (6thC B.C)
The Romans succeeded the Greeks and carried on the tradition of growing grapes and winemaking. However they changed the name of the god of wine from Dionysos to Bacchus but they preserved the prestige of this drink by making its consumption even more common.

Wine made a very successful step into a new religion which was actually very different in philosophy : Christianity considered wine more sacred than the previous religions by accepting it as the blood of Christ. Therefore especially from 4th C. A.D on, when Christianity was recognized as the official religion of Roman Empire, the production and the consumption of wine displayed a tremendous increase mainly in monasteries and the other religious centers. This period witnessed in Turkey the development of new settlements like Cappadocia- for example, unbelievably beautiful region located in Central Turkey which is still one of the main production centers for wine in present day.
The birth of Islam however was an important factor to slow down this development in spite of the fact that some religious orders called Mevlevi and Bektasi which emerged in Turkey in the 13th century continued to use wine as the holy drink during the rituals although this fact was in contradiction with the religion. Throughout the centuries during the Ottoman Empire period, both the production and the consumption of alcohol and wine especially for the non Muslim communities did not encounter any serious restriction from the end of 13th until the beginning of 20th centuries.

After the proclamation of Republic of Turkey in 1923 however, with the departure of Greeks from Turkey and their replacement by Muslim Turks there has been a sharp decrease in the production of wine in Turkey. Still today, because of the religious reasons only two percent of grapes produced in Turkey are used in making wine and the annual consumption of wine in Turkey is only 50 million liters in a year , in other words less than one liter per person.