Wine!

Not much time to post this week since my "free time" has been coopted by the family unit to help in crushing crates and crates of grapes in preparation of this year's supply of Castello Salvatore... I just got home now, and I'm exhausted; we crushed about 40 cases of grapes tonight: Cabernet Sauvignon (yeah!), Pinot Noir (hm), Zinfandel (not my call). Should make for a good range this year, though.


Now, to make this relevant to archaeology, I should mention that the fantastic (and very well-written) book Ancient Wine by Patrick McGovern was brought up in conversation a number of times this evening. The first instance, between me and my father, concluded thusly:

Me: "... as McGovern claims in that book Ancient Wine that I gave you a copy of last Christmas."

Him: "Oh yeah, yeah..."

Me: "So you'll remember winemaking is first documented in the Neolithic, at the site of Hajji Furz Tepe, in Iran..."

Him: "..."

Me: "You never read the book, did you?"

Him: "Well... no... but it was a very thoughtful gift!"

Anyway, all of that to say that, here at A Very Remote Period Indeed, we're all about actualistic studies, be they in flintknapping or winemaking. I like to think of it as a form of ethnoarchaeology (yeah, that's the ticket!). The really fun part of all this, of course, is when we finally taste the end product to test the rather lengthy list of hypotheses I have about just how people might have used this stuff in the past... salute!