calabria – Page 33

20.10.2019

Italy according to the ancient Greeks corresponded to the current Calabria!

It has been hypothesized that the name derives from the word “Italói“, a term used by the Greeks to refer to the Vituli (or Viteli), a population that lived in the extreme tip of the Italian peninsula, the region south of today’s Catanzaro, and which worshiped the simulacrum of a calf (vitulus, in Latin).

KING ITALUS AND HIS POPULATION

The name “Italy” would therefore mean “inhabitants of the land of calves“. In fact, what is usually considered certain is that the name initially indicated only the part located in the extreme south of the Peninsula, Calabria.

At first it was limited to that extreme part of Calabria that lies south of the gulfs of Sant’Eufèmia and Squillace, or, according to another possible interpretation of the sources, roughly in Cilento, between the Sele and Lao rivers (the latter is in Calabria).

“The region, which is now called Italy, anciently was inhabited by the Enotri; in that time their king was Italo, then they changed their name to Itali; succeeding Italo Morgete, they were called Morgeti; then came a Siculo, who divided the people, who were then Morgeti and Siculi; while Itali were those who were called Enotri”

(Antiochus of Syracuse, in Dionysius of Halicarnassus 1, 12 vg).

**A map of population, according to Antiochus**

There are various legends about the character of Italo, king of the Enotri who, according to the myth, would have lived 16 generations before the Trojan War: the name Italia (Italy) would derive from him.

The name Italy was given first to the region corresponding to his kingdom, namely to almost all of Calabria except the northern zone, the name Italy subsequently extended to the whole peninsula (up to the current regions of Tuscany and Marche) as reported by Thucydides, Aristotle, Antiochus of Syracuse and Strabo.

King Italo converted the Enotri from a nomadic to a sedentary people, establishing them in the extreme offshoot of the European coasts, in the present isthmus of Catanzaro between the Gulf of Squillace to the east and the Gulf of Sant’Eufemia to the west.

The capital of his kingdom, according to Strabo, was Pandosia Bruzia, today probably corresponding to the city of Acri.

According to what Strabo tells us, Antiochus of Syracuse (V century BC) already spoke of the borders of Italy in his work “On Italy“, which identified the country with the ancient Enotria.

At that time, Italy extended from the Strait of Sicily to the Gulf of Taranto (east) and the Gulf of Posidonia (west). Later, with the Roman conquest of the following centuries, the term Italy extended to the Alps, including Liguria up to the Varo River and Istria up to Pula. Conclusively, all its inhabitants were considered Italic and Roman.

ITALY AS A LAND OF BULLS

Among the proposals that motivate the name Italy beyond a real linguistic analysis can be remembered that of Domenico Romanelli, who, basing himself on the ancient but never fully accepted hypothesis that it was in relation with the bulls, explained it with the fact that who came from the west sea saw taurine shapes in the Bruzia peninsula (corresponding to actual Calabria).

This idea suits the tradition in ancient times that the lands of present-day Calabria were known as Italy. The Greeks, indeed, indicated the origin of the name in “Ouitoulía” from the word “Italòi” (plural of Italós), a term by which the Achaean settlers who arrived in the lands of present-day Calabria ambiguously designated both the Vituli and a population that inhabited the lands to the south of the isthmus of Catanzaro, whose ethnology was etymologically related to the word indicating the bull, sacred animal to the Vituli and deified by them, namely the bulls themselves: the Greek word “italós” in fact is of Oscan derivation, from “uitlu“, nameyl “bull” (see also the Latin “uitellus“, a form with a diminutive suffix meaning calf).

Thus, “Ouitoulía” came to mean “land of the Vituli” or “land of the bulls“. To support this hypothesis, it is recalled that in the southern part of the Calabrian peninsula there are place names of Magna Graecia origin (some translated in Latin by the Normans) probably referring to the most ancient etymology of the bulls’ land (of cattle):

– Bova (from the latin “bos-bovis”, calf),

– Bovalino (from “bos-bovis”),

– Taurianova (from the latin “taurus”, bull),

– Gioia Tauro (from “taurus”), etc.

Conclusively, also the Greeks would have applied little by little the name “Italy” to an ever-wider region, until the time of the Roman conquest, when it was extended to the entire peninsula.

ITALY LIKE THE LAND OF VOLCANOS

For some linguists who have supported this thesis, the name would be based on a non-attested Greek form (therefore hypothetical) like Aιθαλία (Aithalìa) which in its initial part Aith- (typical of fire-related words) would contain a reference to the volcanic dimension of the peninsula lands. This meaning would resist for example in the name of Etna, in ancient Greek “Aitna“.

This proposal had already been advanced by Gabriele Rosa, according to whom the first Greeks arrived in the peninsula would have called it precisely Aιθαλια (Italy) because the territory was volcanic, flaming and sooty, for the same reason they said Aιθαλια the islands of Elba (Ilva), of Lemnos and Chios, full of iron forges (SOURCE: Gabriele Rosa, The origins of civilization in Europe, Milan 1862-1863).

In all cases, whether Italy is the land of volcanoes or of King Italo or calves, Calabria is at the center of the origin of the name Italy. Something that few know!

6.10.2019

HISTORY OF VITICULTURE IN CALABRIA

It is not possible to give a complete guide on the history of vines and grapes in Calabria, this history is so full of stories, details, discoveries, that it is easier understand its legacy than understand all the profound assets, present in the wine making.
Contrary to the belief that the vine was imported to Europe from ‘the Far East, many fossil finds in northern Europe and the Mediterranean regions show that since the beginning of the Tertiary appeared in Europe plants belonging to the botanical species “Vitis” , the ancestors of modern “Vines” European.

The fossil record shows us very different plants by modern life, diversity due to climate changes that occurred during the Eocene geological eras, Miocene and Pliocene. Only during the Pliocene begin to appear vines like those presenting today as Vitis Praevinifera Saporta and Vitis Subintegra Saporta.

**“Vitis” (Cretacic period, 65 Million of years ago**)

The findings grape seeds dating back to Neolithic times, make us believe that the European man used the grapes in his diet.

During the Bronze Age have been found in Italy only traces of wild grape, the “Vitis Vinifera Silvestris” and this excludes the possibility that at that time the man would dedicate to growing grapes.

The first traces of vine growing for the purpose of wine production found themselves around 2000 years ago in Calabria and Sicily. The cultivation of grapes in southern Italy was probably developed because of the ancient commercial activities of the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations Aegean with southern Italy.

MAGNA GRAECIA (SOUTH OF ITALY) AND THE LEGEND OF CIRÒ

On the Ionian coast of Calabria is Cirò, a small town, where the wine is produced since the time of Ancient Greece (so called Magna Graecia in Calabria).

Legend has it that Philoctetes, return home after the Trojan War, founded the city of Crimissa and Petelia, today’s Cirò and Strongoli. A Crimissa Philoctetes built a shrine in honor of Apollus Aleo, who had healed from the bite of a snake washing his wound with wine. In the area of the cult Dionysus, protector of the screw and of the trees, and expanded rapidly in his honor they took place celebrations in which consumed large amounts of Crimissa wine.

Further, legend has it that during the Olympic Games that were held in Greece, was offered the Cirò wine to the winning athletes. The Ciro wine is now produced in the same places where once stood the city of Crimissa.

VITICULTURE IN ROMAN TIMES

The vine was considered a sacred plant by the Greeks and Romans, and in the regions of southern Italy viticulture never ceased to flourish.

Following the expansion of the Empire and the Roman dominion over the Mediterranean territories, between the fifth and third centuries BC, the rural economy and especially viticulture, underwent profound transformations. Large imports of grain from the new provinces of the empire created a drop in demand and, consequently, a sharp drop in the value of the wheat produced in Italy. Therefore, the large landowners began to revise their agricultural strategies and so the cultivation of vines became one of the agricultural activities more ‘practiced and profitable.

The Romans with the help of Greek and Asian slaves perfected the viticulture and enology. The goodness of Italian wine became well known and his fame opened the way for exports of wine products. The Roman Empire conquered a true monopoly in the production and export of wines that reached its peak in the period between the second century BC and the first century AD, a period marked by many important literary works on viticulture and oenology.

The decline of the Roman Empire and the crisis started from the second century AD and civil wars, the fiscal tightening, the indifference of the landowners and the progressive abandonment of the countryside led to a considerable reduction of the practice of viticulture, to the point that the end of the Roman Empire seemed almost drag even with itself the end of practices of viticulture.

**Meadows near Ciro (Tower of Madonna)**

THE MIDDLE AGE AND THE BYZANTINE AGE

Rossano and Santa Severina, located respectively north and south of Cyrus’, were the most important centers of Byzantine Calabria, founded between 700 and 1050 BC. At that time, the Byzantines took possession of many of land once owned the Roman landowners.

Being wine an indispensable element in the Christian rite of the Eucharistic table, the viticulture was practiced by monks within the convent walls, safe from bandits who roamed the countryside.

The wine was used by the monks to Mass, was offered to the visitors and was also used in moderation by the monks themselves.

Around the year 1000, deeds of gift, sales documents and agricultural contracts show that the cultivation of the vine was no more exclusive of religious orders, it began to flourish beyond the control of the church. Around 1200 the wine began to be exported to Europe and its use spread so widely that the church found it necessary to take severe measures against alcoholism to the point that, in 1215, Pope Innocent III proclaimed drunkenness as a serious offense.

THE “MODERN” CULTIVATION

In 1868, the vineyards were invaded by a terrible parasite from the new world.

The Phylloxera, a small insect that lived in the land and causing the death of the plants by the bite of the roots, came to Europe through the importation of American vines.

These parasites caused a revolution in viticulture practices handed down from father to son through the centuries: whereas, before, the vines were coming from a single “parent” (a European grapevine), it was then necessary have an American root (resistant to phylloxera), on which was later grafted the European grapevine.

The practices of viticulture then began to be based on new farming concepts, otherwise the vines could not resist the terrible attacks of new enemies, microscopic and relentless.

The vineyards of Cirò were therefore uprooted and replanted using imported from screws, which were used as “rootstocks”, on which were grafted the native varieties of Greek Gaglioppo and White, which are the varieties still used today to produce the best wine Cirò “DOC” (an Italian official mark of quality).

THE FIRST WINE CIRO’ BOTTLED

At the end of 1800 the wine first bottles of Cirò began to be produced in small quantities for local consumption by the noble families of the area, owners of the largest vineyards.

At the same time, some passing travelers in Calabria, including Norman Douglas, began to celebrate in their diaries the exceptional quality of the Wine of Cirò…

Tag: calabria

Italy, a nation born in Calabria (near Catanzaro)?

Oenology of Cirò: the star of Calabrian wines