**[OFFER EXTENDED]** ANCIENT WINE GUYS / 15% OFF OUR BEST-LOVED ANCIENT HISTORY 3-PACKS + ANCIENT WINE CLUB MEMBERSHIPS

[Guillermo_M]

Good morning, everyone! Just weighing in here with a special bonus offer…something I’ve been saving for a rainy day!

NEWBIEPALOOZA BONUS:
Post what you’ve ordered in this thread and at the end of the day we’ll choose one lucky thread-posting Berserker who signed up for the club or ordered at least one Pack to receive this extra bonus thank-you gift of a very special wine in their shipment!

2008 Palari Faro DOC, Sicily, Italy - This unique red blend of Nerello Mascalese, Nerello Cappuccio, Nocera, Cappuccio Tignolino, Acitana, Galatena and Calabrese is the “big sibling” to the 2013 Palari Rosso del Soprano in Pack B. Faro DOC has the unique distinction of being one of Julius Caesar’s favorite wine producing regions, and is written about by Pliny the Elder. It’s hard to find a more soulful, compelling, historic, and delicious red in all of Sicily! Not to mention, it’s aged to perfection!

Ordered Packs B and C

Going blind on that Sevilen Nativus that I guess nobody tried. But hey, what’s a little adventure!

Thanks guys

[Ryan_W1hera]

Good morning, everyone! Just weighing in here with a special bonus offer…something I’ve been saving for a rainy day!

NEWBIEPALOOZA BONUS:
Post what you’ve ordered in this thread and at the end of the day we’ll choose one lucky thread-posting Berserker who signed up for the club or ordered at least one Pack to receive this extra bonus thank-you gift of a very special wine in their shipment!

2008 Palari Faro DOC, Sicily, Italy - This unique red blend of Nerello Mascalese, Nerello Cappuccio, Nocera, Cappuccio Tignolino, Acitana, Galatena and Calabrese is the “big sibling” to the 2013 Palari Rosso del Soprano in Pack B. Faro DOC has the unique distinction of being one of Julius Caesar’s favorite wine producing regions, and is written about by Pliny the Elder. It’s hard to find a more soulful, compelling, historic, and delicious red in all of Sicily! Not to mention, it’s aged to perfection!

Ordered Packs B and C

Going blind on that Sevilen Nativus that I guess nobody tried. But hey, what’s a little adventure!

Thanks guys

Thanks a bunch for the order Guillermo! The Sevilen Nativus Narince is a really cool white wine! From your forum signature I see you liked some great Assyrtiko and there’s definitely a comparison one could draw there in the Nativus, though not exactly the same volcanic mineral focus as a Santorini. This Narince has a lot of texture, aromatic green fruits, and a nutty almond/pine nut backbone to it. Fun stuff that I really hope you like! My recommended pairing is with a simple flaky white fish, roasted in the broiler, topped with a lemon-butter-garlic-caper sauce.

[Scott_Brunson]

Ordered B and D plus a bunch of add-ons

[Ryan_W1hera]

3. A lot of your material mentions myths alongside history. What is your favorite link between an AWG wine and a story from ancient myth rather than ancient history?

Oooooo… that’s a great question! (this is Dana again!)

One of my favorite connections between myth and an AWG wine has to be in Homer’s Odyssey… not only must Odysseus find his way home across the “wine-dark” sea, (tricking the Cyclops into drinking a skin of undiluted wine to aid in their escape along the way!) but there is a super interesting connection with the Island of Circe. Some ancient historians like Dictys of Crete posited that Circe’s Island may have been a reference to Sardinia. As we know from the myth, Odysseus is waylaid by Circe for quite some time, who plies him with excellent wine and the promise of immortality. As we also know, Sardinia does indeed have excellent wine, particulary Cannonau (essentially old-school Grenache!). The super cool connection here is that Cannonau has 2-3 times the amount of artery-scrubbing flavonoids and antioxidants as other wines, leading researches to believe that the regular consumption of Cannonau is a big part of why Sardinia is a “Blue Zone” with some of the longest living folks around! A taste of immortality promised and delivered - quite literally, “to your health!”

Dana

[Guillermo_M]

Thanks a bunch for the order Guillermo! The Sevilen Nativus Narince is a really cool white wine! From your forum signature I see you liked some great Assyrtiko and there’s definitely a comparison one could draw there in the Nativus, though not exactly the same volcanic mineral focus as a Santorini. This Narince has a lot of texture, aromatic green fruits, and a nutty almond/pine nut backbone to it. Fun stuff that I really hope you like! My recommended pairing is with a simple flaky white fish, roasted in the broiler, topped with a lemon-butter-garlic-caper sauce.

For that, I’d have to get whoever’s doing the cooking at Scott’s house. I mean, did you see his pairings?

[Ryan_W1hera]

Ordered B and D plus a bunch of add-ons

Brilliant Scott! I really think you’ll like those clubs - Thanks!!

Dana

[Rich_K0rz_nk0]

3. A lot of your material mentions myths alongside history. What is your favorite link between an AWG wine and a story from ancient myth rather than ancient history?

Oooooo… that’s a great question! (this is Dana again!)

One of my favorite connections between myth and an AWG wine has to be in Homer’s Odyssey… not only must Odysseus find his way home across the “wine-dark” sea, (tricking the Cyclops into drinking a skin of undiluted wine to aid in their escape along the way!) but there is a super interesting connection with the Island of Circe. Some ancient historians like Dictys of Crete posited that Circe’s Island may have been a reference to Sardinia. As we know from the myth, Odysseus is waylaid by Circe for quite some time, who plies him with excellent wine and the promise of immortality. As we also know, Sardinia does indeed have excellent wine, particulary Cannonau (essentially old-school Grenache!). The super cool connection here is that Cannonau has 2-3 times the amount of artery-scrubbing flavonoids and antioxidants as other wines, leading researches to believe that the regular consumption of Cannonau is a big part of why Sardinia is a “Blue Zone” with some of the longest living folks around! A taste of immortality promised and delivered - quite literally, “to your health!”

Dana

That settles it, I’m moving to Sardinia.

[Ryan_W1hera]

3. A lot of your material mentions myths alongside history. What is your favorite link between an AWG wine and a story from ancient myth rather than ancient history?

Oooooo… that’s a great question! (this is Dana again!)

One of my favorite connections between myth and an AWG wine has to be in Homer’s Odyssey… not only must Odysseus find his way home across the “wine-dark” sea, (tricking the Cyclops into drinking a skin of undiluted wine to aid in their escape along the way!) but there is a super interesting connection with the Island of Circe. Some ancient historians like Dictys of Crete posited that Circe’s Island may have been a reference to Sardinia. As we know from the myth, Odysseus is waylaid by Circe for quite some time, who plies him with excellent wine and the promise of immortality. As we also know, Sardinia does indeed have excellent wine, particulary Cannonau (essentially old-school Grenache!). The super cool connection here is that Cannonau has 2-3 times the amount of artery-scrubbing flavonoids and antioxidants as other wines, leading researches to believe that the regular consumption of Cannonau is a big part of why Sardinia is a “Blue Zone” with some of the longest living folks around! A taste of immortality promised and delivered - quite literally, “to your health!”

Dana

Also important to mention that the Ancient Wine Guys has done numerous “The Wines of Homer’s Odyssey” tasting dinner events here in the SF Bay Area in case anyone’s ever interested in hosting us for a Wine Berserkers special event…!

Other dinner topics we’ve done include: “The Wines of Dante’s Inferno” (9 levels of hell, 9 wines, go figure), and “The Wines of the Labors of Hercules” – crazy fun nights!

[Ryan_W1hera]

3. A lot of your material mentions myths alongside history. What is your favorite link between an AWG wine and a story from ancient myth rather than ancient history?

Oooooo… that’s a great question! (this is Dana again!)

One of my favorite connections between myth and an AWG wine has to be in Homer’s Odyssey… not only must Odysseus find his way home across the “wine-dark” sea, (tricking the Cyclops into drinking a skin of undiluted wine to aid in their escape along the way!) but there is a super interesting connection with the Island of Circe. Some ancient historians like Dictys of Crete posited that Circe’s Island may have been a reference to Sardinia. As we know from the myth, Odysseus is waylaid by Circe for quite some time, who plies him with excellent wine and the promise of immortality. As we also know, Sardinia does indeed have excellent wine, particulary Cannonau (essentially old-school Grenache!). The super cool connection here is that Cannonau has 2-3 times the amount of artery-scrubbing flavonoids and antioxidants as other wines, leading researches to believe that the regular consumption of Cannonau is a big part of why Sardinia is a “Blue Zone” with some of the longest living folks around! A taste of immortality promised and delivered - quite literally, “to your health!”

Dana

That settles it, I’m moving to Sardinia.

Ha! We’ll see you there Rich! We actually agonized over which obscure Sardinian red variety to put in for the Wines of the First Punic War, I myself have a major fondness for Sardinian Cagnulari (Poderi Parpinello’s is an amazing sleeper wine) and Monica-based red wines, but (Spoiler Alert: same as Julius Caesar did in the First Punic War), the Cannonau won it out in the end.

[Rich_K0rz_nk0]

Oooooo… that’s a great question! (this is Dana again!)

One of my favorite connections between myth and an AWG wine has to be in Homer’s Odyssey… not only must Odysseus find his way home across the “wine-dark” sea, (tricking the Cyclops into drinking a skin of undiluted wine to aid in their escape along the way!) but there is a super interesting connection with the Island of Circe. Some ancient historians like Dictys of Crete posited that Circe’s Island may have been a reference to Sardinia. As we know from the myth, Odysseus is waylaid by Circe for quite some time, who plies him with excellent wine and the promise of immortality. As we also know, Sardinia does indeed have excellent wine, particulary Cannonau (essentially old-school Grenache!). The super cool connection here is that Cannonau has 2-3 times the amount of artery-scrubbing flavonoids and antioxidants as other wines, leading researches to believe that the regular consumption of Cannonau is a big part of why Sardinia is a “Blue Zone” with some of the longest living folks around! A taste of immortality promised and delivered - quite literally, “to your health!”

Dana

That settles it, I’m moving to Sardinia.

Ha! We’ll see you there Rich! We actually agonized over which obscure Sardinian red variety to put in for the Wines of the First Punic War, I myself have a major fondness for Sardinian Cagnulari (Poderi Parpinello’s is an amazing sleeper wine) and Monica-based red wines, but (Spoiler Alert: same as Julius Caesar did in the First Punic War), the Cannonau won it out in the end.

Lol, great, we’ll start a wine commune. I actually have an old school Greek version of Homer’s Odyssey to start the library. I want to be the librarian if we get it off the ground. Fend off IT. Either that, or I bring our commune crypto currency to ICO and we retire as crypto billionaires.

[Edward_H_Earles]

On the subject of Retsina, a Greek friend of mine told me that the custom of putting pine resin in wine originated with Greek merchant sailors putting it into the wine so the Romans would not raid their ships to steal the wine (pine tar evidently not being to Roman tastes). I’ve no idea if this is true; I read somewhere else that it was a consequence of using pine tar to seal the stoppers of amphorae.

[Ryan_W1hera]

That settles it, I’m moving to Sardinia.

Ha! We’ll see you there Rich! We actually agonized over which obscure Sardinian red variety to put in for the Wines of the First Punic War, I myself have a major fondness for Sardinian Cagnulari (Poderi Parpinello’s is an amazing sleeper wine) and Monica-based red wines, but (Spoiler Alert: same as Julius Caesar did in the First Punic War), the Cannonau won it out in the end.

Lol, great, we’ll start a wine commune. I actually have an old school Greek version of Homer’s Odyssey to start the library. I want to be the librarian if we get it off the ground. Fend off IT. Either that, or I bring our commune crypto currency to ICO and we retire as crypto billionaires.

That’s a smashing idea! Wait, hang on a sec, I thought this already was the thread for crypto billionaires…? Am I in the wrong place?!

[Rich_K0rz_nk0]

Ha! We’ll see you there Rich! We actually agonized over which obscure Sardinian red variety to put in for the Wines of the First Punic War, I myself have a major fondness for Sardinian Cagnulari (Poderi Parpinello’s is an amazing sleeper wine) and Monica-based red wines, but (Spoiler Alert: same as Julius Caesar did in the First Punic War), the Cannonau won it out in the end.

Lol, great, we’ll start a wine commune. I actually have an old school Greek version of Homer’s Odyssey to start the library. I want to be the librarian if we get it off the ground. Fend off IT. Either that, or I bring our commune crypto currency to ICO and we retire as crypto billionaires.

That’s a smashing idea! Wait, hang on a sec, I thought this already was the thread for crypto billionaires…? Am I in the wrong place?!

We just haven’t exchanged fake screenshots of wealth yet. If you are crypto billionaire though, you may be asked to leave. It can get awkward when we compare our hypothetical wealth.

[J3ff_P3arson]

For the Romans who could afford it, imported Greek wine was always a go-to status symbol until the latter part of the 2nd century BCE. What changed? In 121 BCE, a vintage of Falernian wine from Campania was so great that it changed elite Romans’ minds about their own wines (think Judgment of Paris!). Named the Opimian Vintage after one of the consuls that year, it became so famous that it (or forgeries of it!) were still being sold at auction more than 200 years later. After that, the Romans invested much more heavily in their own wine industry, both in Italy and further afield (Sicily, Spain, France, etc.).

Thanks, Jeff - I love this “Judgment of Paris” story!

More questions -

1. You touched on Athens and Rome above, what about Constantinople? After the fall of the Western Empire, were the Emperors and Courts in the East still drinking mostly wines from what are now Greece and Italy? What about Georgia, Anatolia, the Levant, etc.?

2. What about the Demes in Constantinople? Did the Blues have allegiance to one particular wine, eschewing another as a favorite of the Greens, and vice-versa?

3. A lot of your material mentions myths alongside history. What is your favorite link between an AWG wine and a story from ancient myth rather than ancient history?

4. Do you have any favorite wine stories or discoveries that have emerged from the various excavations/studies at Pompeii?

5. Do you have any favorite history podcasts covering these periods? I’m a fan of Mike Duncan’s “The History of Rome,” Robin Pierson’s “The History of Byzantium,” and Patrick Wyman’s “Tides of History.”

6. Let’s say my village was under Roman occupation and I was a very naughty boy. If I wanted to paint “Romans Go Home!” on the walls around the town forum, in correct Latin, what would I write?

Just getting off teaching Latin for the day, so I’ll humbly weigh in on #6! Should be “Romani ite domum!” John Cleese gets it right but makes a small mistake in explaining the grammar to the soldier before threatening to cut his balls off (he calls domum “locative” when it’s actually “accusative of place to which or direction toward”).

[Rich_K0rz_nk0]

Moving on to wine…

If I am in the market for something old school Italian ancestry what’s you recommendation from your offerings?

[Ryan_W1hera]

For the Romans who could afford it, imported Greek wine was always a go-to status symbol until the latter part of the 2nd century BCE. What changed? In 121 BCE, a vintage of Falernian wine from Campania was so great that it changed elite Romans’ minds about their own wines (think Judgment of Paris!). Named the Opimian Vintage after one of the consuls that year, it became so famous that it (or forgeries of it!) were still being sold at auction more than 200 years later. After that, the Romans invested much more heavily in their own wine industry, both in Italy and further afield (Sicily, Spain, France, etc.).

Thanks, Jeff - I love this “Judgment of Paris” story!

More questions -

1. You touched on Athens and Rome above, what about Constantinople? After the fall of the Western Empire, were the Emperors and Courts in the East still drinking mostly wines from what are now Greece and Italy? What about Georgia, Anatolia, the Levant, etc.?

2. What about the Demes in Constantinople? Did the Blues have allegiance to one particular wine, eschewing another as a favorite of the Greens, and vice-versa?

3. A lot of your material mentions myths alongside history. What is your favorite link between an AWG wine and a story from ancient myth rather than ancient history?

4. Do you have any favorite wine stories or discoveries that have emerged from the various excavations/studies at Pompeii?

5. Do you have any favorite history podcasts covering these periods? I’m a fan of Mike Duncan’s “The History of Rome,” Robin Pierson’s “The History of Byzantium,” and Patrick Wyman’s “Tides of History.”

6. Let’s say my village was under Roman occupation and I was a very naughty boy. If I wanted to paint “Romans Go Home!” on the walls around the town forum, in correct Latin, what would I write?

Just getting off teaching Latin for the day, so I’ll humbly weigh in on #6! Should be “Romani ite domum!” John Cleese gets it right but makes a small mistake in explaining the grammar to the soldier before threatening to cut his balls off (he calls domum “locative” when it’s actually “accusative of place to which or direction toward”).

I took one semester of Latin in college and now I’m having repressed traumatic flashbacks from remembering lessons about “locative” “ablative” and “accusative” cases… thanks JP

[Ryan_W1hera]

Moving on to wine…

If I am in the market for something old school Italian ancestry what’s you recommendation from your offerings?

For old-school Italian ancestry it doesn’t get much older than the Punic Wars! Pack B’s reds are very very classic, with the Nero d’Avola being the young buck of the bunch (it’s a really lovely fresh take on the grape). The Palari Rosso del Soprano punches way above its weight class, and I’m really excited to hear from whoever ends up with the “big sibling” version, the Faro DOC that Jeff pulled from his cellar to offer to a lucky Berserker. The Rosso del Soprano is perfectly aged, has that nice rustic, at-home-in-a-trattoria kinda vibe, and shows a great range of native varieties. The Templum is structured old-school Italian as well, made to last, and definitely not one of those lighter, rosé-colored Grenaches.

Now, before I run afoul of our our resident Sicilian, Dana De Pietro, I should probably mention that two of these wines are Sicilian first and Italian second…! Or something like that!?

[Ann_Brown]

Just ordered Packs B and C! What a cool idea - will go over well in my household of history/anthropology geeks and wine lovers Was just on the phone with my Anthro major daughter who was also intrigued with this entire concept!

[Ryan_W1hera]

Just ordered Packs B and C! What a cool idea - will go over well in my household of history/anthropology geeks and wine lovers Was just on the phone with my Anthro major daughter who was also intrigued with this entire concept!

Thanks for the order Ann! Really excited to have your household of fellow geeks try the wines and enjoy the content! You can tell your daughter that we promise it’s less dry than a textbook and she won’t need to worry about taking notes or any upcoming midterms on it!

If she enjoys the wines and thinks of any cool club pack ideas definitely let us know! We love suggestions!!

[Rich_K0rz_nk0]

Was trading messages outside this, looks like Packs B and D are on my docket.