December 2

December 2, 1547: Hernán Cortés died. Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro Altamirano, 1st Marquess of the Valley of Oaxaca, was in charge of an expedition that, in the early 16th century, brought much of what is now mainland Mexico under the control of the King of Castile and led to the collapse of the Aztec Empire. Cortés belonged to the group of Spanish conquistadors and explorers that launched the first phase of the Spanish colonization of the Americas. Cortés decided to go for adventure and money in the New World after growing up in a lower-class family in Medellin, Spain. He left for Hispaniola and then went to Cuba, where he received an encomienda (the right to the labor of certain subjects). In the second Spanish town to be built on the island, he temporarily served as alcalde (magistrate). He was chosen to serve as the expedition’s third captain in 1519, and he also assisted in raising some of the money for it. Cortés defied the command to bring back the expedition because he disliked Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, the governor of Cuba. Legend has it that while celebrating the conquest of the Aztec Empire in 1521, Hernán Cortés and his men quickly consumed all of the wine they had brought with them from Spain. As a result, Cortés’ first official act as governor was to direct the planting of grapevines all over New Spain.

December 2, 1997: Adelaide Hills Wine Show started. The National Wine Centre of Australia in Adelaide, South Australia, puts on the Adelaide Hills Wine Show every year. The competition is available to any winemakers who source at least 85 percent of their grapes from vineyards in the Adelaide Hills.

December 2, 2012: An intruder broke into Gianfranco Soldera’s celebrated Case Basse winery in Montalcino and opened the taps on his barrels and tanks, draining more than 60,000 litres, roughly six vintages of Brunello, onto the cellar floor; the destruction was discovered the next morning. The attack shook the Italian wine world, coming amid a wider Brunello-blending controversy that had put several Montalcino producers under investigation.For more dates in wine history, click here.

Hero image: Librarygroover / CC BY 2.0. Source: Wikimedia Commons.