Aglianico
del Vulture

There is a saying in Basilicata: Non c'è Barolo senza Barile — there is no Barolo without Barile. It is a play on words and a statement of geological fact. The great red wines of Piedmont are made from Nebbiolo. The great red wine of Basilicata is made from Aglianico, a grape that Nebbiolo critics acknowledge as its equal in structure, aging potential, and complexity. The price difference is significant. The fame difference is extraordinary.

Aglianico del Vulture is grown on the slopes of Monte Vulture — an extinct volcano in the northern part of Basilicata, its last eruption approximately 130,000 years ago. The volcanic basalt and tuff soils force vine roots deep into mineral-rich geology that has been building complexity for millennia. The result is a wine of uncommon character: deeply colored, iron and dried rose on the nose, firm tannins that require years — sometimes decades — to reveal what they are, high acidity that gives it structure for long aging, and a mineral quality that is distinctly and irreducibly of this place.

The History — 2,700 Years on Volcanic Soil

The Aglianico grape was brought to southern Italy by Greek colonists in the 7th century BC — approximately 700 years before the birth of Christ, at a time when the Ionian coast of what is now Basilicata was part of Magna Graecia. The name itself is a Latinization of Hellenico — the Hellenic grape. It is one of the oldest cultivated grape varieties in continuous production in Italy.

For most of its 2,700-year history, Aglianico del Vulture was a bulk wine — the grapes harvested and sold to producers throughout Italy to strengthen and deepen wines from less robust grapes. Elena Fucci's winery manager told a visiting journalist that 40% of Aglianico production has historically been sold outside the region to improve other wines, including Chianti. The local grape was scaffolding for wines that got the credit.

The transformation came slowly, beginning in the late 20th century when producers like D'Angelo and Paternoster began estate-bottling and demonstrating what the grape could do in its own right. The appellation received DOC status in 1971 and DOCG — Italy's highest wine classification — in 2010. The new generation of producers, loosely grouped under the name Generazione Vulture, has taken the reputation further still.

The Wine — What to Expect

The Producers — Who to Seek Out

Monte Vulture — Beyond the Wine

Monte Vulture is worth understanding as a landscape as well as a wine appellation. The extinct volcano — last eruption approximately 130,000 years ago — rises to 1,326 metres above sea level in the northern part of Basilicata, its crater lakes Lago Grande and Lago Piccolo di Monticchio sitting in the caldera. The slopes support chestnut and oak forests at higher elevations, vineyards on the middle slopes at 200-700 metres, and the towns of Rionero in Vulture, Barile, Melfi, and Venosa around the base.

Melfi — the most historically significant town on the Vulture — sits 531 metres above sea level with a Norman castle that was one of the most important fortresses in medieval southern Italy. Frederick II held councils here. The castle now houses a museum with one of the finest collections of ancient finds in Basilicata. The town itself retains its medieval street plan and is undervisited relative to its historical significance.

Venosa is the birthplace of Horace — the Latin poet Quintus Horatius Flaccus, born in 65 BC — and one of the most layered towns in Basilicata. The Incompiuta, the unfinished Norman church begun in the 11th century and abandoned with the apses still open to the sky, is one of the most unusual medieval buildings in the south. The Jewish catacombs of Venosa are among the most significant traces of Jewish presence in ancient southern Italy. The Cantina di Venosa is here.

Melfi & Venosa — What to See

Frequently Asked Questions