History of German Wine

Germany makes wine at the very northern edge of where the vine can ripen, on slopes so steep they must be worked by hand. From this improbable frontier comes Riesling — for many critics the most nuanced white grape on earth — along with a uniquely German idea: that a wine should be classified not by region alone, but by exactly how ripe its grapes were when picked¹.

Rome’s northern frontier

Wine came to Germany with the Roman legions, who planted the banks of the Mosel and Rhine to supply the frontier city of Trier. The vine took to the cool, steep river valleys, and after Rome fell it was the Church that kept viticulture alive through the Middle Ages. Germany became, and remains, the northernmost of the classic wine countries — a place where ripeness is never guaranteed and every sunny slope is precious¹.

Riesling, king of the slate

The grape that made Germany famous is Riesling, first recorded by name in a cellar account of 1435. On the dark slate of the Mosel and the sun-catching hills of the Rheingau, it ripens slowly and holds on to a piercing acidity, giving wines that can be bone-dry or lusciously sweet yet always taste of their stony ground. Few grapes reflect their terroir so faithfully, or age so gracefully over decades².

The monks and the first Riesling estate

No place tells the story better than Schloss Johannisberg in the Rheingau, where vines have grown since 817. In 1720 its slopes were replanted entirely with Riesling, making it the first estate in the world devoted to the grape. Perched above the Rhine, its Benedictine cellars became a laboratory for German wine — and the setting for its most famous accident³.

The messenger who came late

By tradition, the pickers at Schloss Johannisberg could not begin the harvest until a messenger returned from the abbot with formal permission. In 1775, the story goes, the rider was badly delayed, and by the time he arrived the grapes had shrivelled and grown mouldy with noble rot. The monks pressed the ruined-looking fruit anyway — and made a wine of astonishing sweetness and depth. The Spätlese, or “late harvest,” was born, and Auslese and the even sweeter styles soon followed⁴.

The grapes were shrivelled and rotten — and made the finest wine anyone had tasted.— the Spätlese legend, Schloss Johannisberg, 1775⁴

A ladder of ripeness

That discovery shaped the whole German system. Rather than rank wines by vineyard alone, Germany grades them by the ripeness of the grapes at harvest — a ladder rising from Kabinett through Spätlese and Auslese to the intensely sweet Beerenauslese, Trockenbeerenauslese and frozen-grape Eiswein. Codified in the German Wine Law of 1971, this Prädikat system is unlike any other in the wine world⁵.

Crash and revival

Germany’s reputation nearly drowned in sugar. In the later twentieth century, floods of cheap, semi-sweet Liebfraumilch — think Blue Nun — taught the world to dismiss German wine as sweet and simple. The backlash sparked a revival: a new generation turned to bone-dry (trocken) Rieslings and top “Grosses Gewächs” bottlings under the growers’ association, the VDP, restoring Germany to the front rank of fine white wine⁶.

Frequently asked questions

Read more

• Riesling, Germany’s noble grape
• How Champagne conquered the world
• The story of French wine

References

1. Encyclopaedia Britannica — Rhine wine. www.britannica.com ↩
2. Encyclopaedia Britannica — Riesling. www.britannica.com ↩
3. Wines of Germany (Deutsches Weininstitut) — Schloss Johannisberg. www.winesofgermany.com ↩
4. Schloss Johannisberg — History of the estate. www.schloss-johannisberg.de ↩
5. Deutsches Weininstitut — Wines of Germany. www.winesofgermany.com ↩
6. VDP — Verband Deutscher Prädikatsweingüter. www.vdp.de ↩

Recommended reading

Vintage: The Story of Wine
Hugh Johnson
Excellent on Germany’s monks, Riesling and the rise of the Prädikat idea.

A Short History of Wine
Rod Phillips
Sets German wine and its ripeness classification in global context.

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