“Contains Sulfites” Has a 1487 Ancestor: When Sulfur in Wine First Needed a Law

By Ken Wytsma · Researched, fact-checked & verified by the TDIWH Editorial Team.

The warning on the back of the bottle — contains sulfites — sounds like a modern anxiety. It has a surprisingly old ancestor. In 1487, German authorities were already writing rules about how much sulfur a winemaker was allowed to burn in a barrel.

The rule before the chemistry

In 1487, in the patchwork of states that made up the Holy Roman Empire, a decree set a legal limit on the sulfuring of wine. It is usually credited to Maximilian I, then King of the Romans, though some accounts attribute it to the reigning emperor, Frederick III. The best-documented figure for the cap is around 16 grams of sulfur per thousand litres, roughly 32 milligrams per litre — startlingly close to the thresholds natural winemakers argue over today, though that precise number rests on a thin documentary trail.

The telling part is why a limit was needed at all. Sulfuring had become common enough to be abused. Some authorities had tried banning it outright before settling on the more workable answer: allow it, but cap it. The first sulfur law was not about requiring the practice. It was about stopping people from using too much.

That places wine inside an older German instinct for purity rules. A wine ordinance of 1487, followed by another in 1498, predates the famous Bavarian beer purity law of 1516 by nearly three decades. Wine got its additive regulation first.

Medieval winemakers had found wine’s master preservative long before anyone understood the chemistry. The first laws weren’t written to require it — they were written to rein it in.

What a burning wick actually did

The tool was simple. A strip of linen or a bundle of wood chips was coated in molten sulfur, sometimes mixed with incense and aromatic herbs, then hung inside an empty cask and lit. As it burned it filled the barrel with sulfur-dioxide gas, fumigating the wood before the wine went in. The Germans called it the Schwefelschnitt, the sulfur cut.

Without it, wine was nearly defenceless. Left alone in porous wood through a warm summer, it browned as it oxidised and then soured as acetic bacteria turned it toward vinegar, often within months. Sulfur changed the odds. It is both an antimicrobial, suppressing the wild yeasts and bacteria that spoil wine, and an antioxidant, binding the oxygen that would otherwise flatten and brown it.

The trick travelled. Dutch and English traders burned sulfur matches in their casks before filling them for long sea voyages, which is how wine survived months in a ship’s hold and arrived still worth drinking. The same medieval barrel technology quietly underwrote the entire long-distance wine trade.

From a cellar to your back label

Follow the thread forward and it runs straight to the fine print on a modern bottle. The reason a wine can sit in a shop for a couple of years, cross an ocean in a container, and still age gracefully in your cellar is the same molecule the 1487 rule was rationing. Today the science is exact (free versus bound sulfur dioxide, molecular targets, legal maxima), and the disclosure is global: in the United States, any wine above ten parts per million must say “contains sulfites.”

It is worth resisting one tidy myth along the way. You will often read that the Romans sulfured their wine, citing Homer or Pliny. The evidence is thin. Even the winemaker-historian who did most to popularise the ancient timeline later conceded, when pressed, that there is no documentary proof the Romans used sulfur to preserve wine, only that its sterilising smoke was known.

So the honest starting line is 1487, in a German cellar, with a burning wick and a legal cap. Medieval winemakers had found wine’s master preservative long before anyone could explain it. The first laws were not written to demand it. They were written to rein it in.

This day in wine history

• 1487 — A decree in the German lands (usually credited to Maximilian I) regulates the sulfuring of wine and sets a maximum permitted amount — the first explicit rule for sulfur in winemaking.
• 1498 — A follow-up German wine-control ordinance continues the same purity tradition.
• 1516 — The Bavarian Reinheitsgebot regulates beer; wine’s additive rule had come nearly thirty years earlier.
• Early 20th century — Winemakers in French North Africa systematise sulfur dioxide dosing, the basis of modern practice.
• Modern era — Mandatory “contains sulfites” labelling (10 ppm and up in the U.S.) closes the loop from the 1487 ceiling to today’s disclosure.

Frequently asked questions

Read more

For more on the craft and chemistry that shaped the bottle in your hand, browse our Turning Points in Wine History collection at This Day in Wine History.

Further reading

As an Amazon Associate, This Day in Wine History earns from qualifying purchases. Book links are affiliate links; cover images are used for identification.

A Short History of Wine
Rod Phillips
Sweeping global history covering ancient preservation, sulfur, spoilage and winemaking techniques.

The Science of Wine: From Vine to Glass
Jamie Goode
Accessible science of winemaking, including sulfur dioxide’s role against spoilage.

Sources

1. Hans-Peter Schmidt, “Die Geschichte des Schwefels im Wein,” Ithaka Journal — the 1487 decree of Maximilian I and the ~16 g/1,000 L cap (and the author’s own caution on Roman use). ithaka-journal.net
2. Matthias Düsi, “Reinheitsgebot für Wein von 1487 und 1498 — Weinkontrolle im Heiligen Römischen Reich,” Düsiblog — the 1487/1498 wine-purity ordinances. duesiblog.de
3. “Making Sense of Sulfites,” Wines & Vines / WineBusiness Analytics — the 1487 decree, the sulfur-and-herb barrel wick, and sulfur dioxide’s dual role. winebusinessanalytics.com
4. “Adding Sulphur to Wine,” MoreThanOrganic — the 1487 German decree, the disputed Roman claim, and the trade’s later systematising of sulfur. morethanorganic.com
5. “Sulfur Candles in Ancient Winemaking,” O’Vineyards — on the weak evidence for Roman sulfuring and the 1487 first explicit mention. ovineyards.com

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