Natural Wine Is Not a Fad: What a prominent Georgian from the 1800s can tell us about a centuries-old debate
In March, three of France’s regulatory agencies adopted an official charter certifying wines produced according to the “natural method.” Wines bearing the vin méthode nature certification must be made from hand-picked grapes grown on certified organic vines, fermented with only ambient native yeast, and finished with only minimal application of additives, adulterants, and other forms of intervention.
As Forbes’ Jill Barth notes, “both fans and detractors of natural wines” have, until now, found the lack of a formal certification process “a point of potential confusion or threat of fraud for the consumer.” The adoption of a natural wine certification arrives on the heels of the formation of the Union for the Defense of Natural Wines, a French lobbying organization formed to advance the interests of natural winemakers in the midst of recent setbacks for the industry, and is a major triumph for the natural wine movement as a whole.
For many, the natural wine boom might seem like it came from nowhere. It might even seem like a fad. But the Republic of Georgia, home to the oldest evidence of winemaking in the world, has hosted a fierce debate over the future of low-intervention winemaking techniques for centuries. Georgia’s traditional qvevri method was declared part of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2013 and is in the midst of a major renaissance.
The true purpose of winemaking, its beginning and end, is to make wine naturally, following the process by which nature itself transforms grape juice into wine…
Ilia Chavchavaze
Georgian Qvevri before being buried under ground
Qvevri, clay vessels sometimes large enough to carry 3,000 liters in volume, facilitate natural fermentation with native yeasts from the air in contact with skins, stems, and all. This skin contact allows white grape juice to take on a characteristic amber color over the course of the winemaking process. This is a method with roots deep in Georgia’s 8,000-vintage history, but it hasn’t been preserved without a fight. From the time of Georgia’s first contact with modern, high-intervention European winemaking, natural wine advocates have fought fiercely against the temptation to sacrifice purity for the sake of efficiency.
Despite everything, the present pandemic offers a valuable opportunity for many of us who work in wine: the free time to continue our education, and to share the fruits of that education with others. For us at Georgian House, this means an opportunity to explore the roots of Georgia’s native natural wine movement and offer a glimpse of its history through documents little-known in the West, such as Prince Ilia Chavchavadze’s “Georgian Winemaking” (1887). Prince Ilia Chavchavadze (1837—1907), affectionately called the “Father of the Nation” by Georgians, was perhaps the foremost champion of the Georgian natural wine movement. Chavchavadze was a writer, publisher, jurist, banker, and politician, renowned in his own day, and led a revival of Georgia’s national movement in the latter half of the 19th century. A proponent of liberal democracy and free markets, he was a fierce critic of his country’s obsolete systems of governance and its technological stagnation under Russian rule. Nonetheless, Chavchavadze was a sincere and ardent traditionalist, profoundly concerned with the preservation and advancement of Georgia’s cultural heritage and the pride of his fellow Georgians in their culture.
Unsurprisingly, a key concern of Chavchavadze’s was his country’s native winemaking traditions. In 1887, he penned a series of articles responding to contemporary critics of “backward” natural winemaking practices, later collected and published under the title “Georgian Winemaking.” Intimately familiar with modern European methods, he maintained that Georgian natural winemaking had not only a right to exist as part of the country’s precious intangible heritage, but could rightly claim superiority over European methods. The text remains a testament to the centrality of wine in Georgian culture, a touchstone for Georgia’s natural wine renaissance, and a reminder that the fierce debate about intervention in winemaking has a lengthy and fascinating history.
Unfortunately, no complete English translation is available, but the following excerpts (translations by authors) provide a summary:
Georgian winemaking has thousands of years of history, and thus there must be a reason why our nation prefers its own method of winemaking and avoids European methods even to this day. Perhaps that reason should be respected. […] In no way are we saying that our method of winemaking is perfect and without flaws. We cannot say this. It lacks many things. But the “weaknesses” of our wines alleged by experts, both domestic and foreign, may turn out to be strengths. If ever our wines find a way into the world’s markets, it will be thanks to these strengths. (If only—by God’s grace—we can survive our critics!)
The true purpose of winemaking, its beginning and end, is to make wine naturally, following the process by which nature itself transforms grape juice into wine […]
The primary virtue of every kind of food or drink must be to benefit the body, and not to harm it. Can transforming grape juice through artificial adulterants really be so attractive as to justify dispensing with our way of winemaking, which is focused on purity, on ensuring that the juice is not damaged by any additives, and on preserving the wine’s own natural character?
As Prince Chavchavadze says, Georgian natural winemaking does not guarantee an absence of flaws. Indeed, winemaking without additives and preservatives is a process fraught with dangers, and keeping the natural process undisturbed requires a great deal of skill and sensitivity on the part of the winemaker. Not all natural wines succeed in this respect! But for traditional, artisanal natural wines, like those Ilia Chavchavadze treasured, there can be no substitutes. Georgia is home to artisan winemakers carrying on the most venerable and sophisticated tradition of natural winemaking in the world. Their wines embody the one ingredient essential for the health of our bodies and spirits: “the almighty, unmistakable, wise master called Nature.”
If you’re interested in continuing your natural wine journey, we’re partnering with Potomac Wines and Spirits to offer a 6-bottle Georgian natural wine sampler: an exploration of Georgia’s unique regions, styles, and grape varietals delivered to you at home.
