A History of Viticulture on the Black Sea Coast of the Caucasus
A glimpse into the history of grape-growing on the Black Sea coast, from the vines tended by Circassians and Abkhazians to the first large estates of the nineteenth century.
First published in Russian in Reference Book and Guide to the Black Sea Governorate (Novorossiysk, Part II, 1907). Translated into English by AbkhazWorld.
“Unbroken stretches of vineyards could be found in the valleys of the Ashe, Shakhe, Psezuape, Dagomys, Sochi and Agura rivers. Here, vines were generally trained up trees to heights of 30–40 feet (9–12 metres), with their trunks reaching six vershoks (about 27 centimetres) in diameter at the base.
According to long-established indigenous residents, including Gasan-Legas, the Circassians of the Velyaminovsky (Tuapse) district cultivated three grape varieties: senef, a white table grape; chyuna, a red wine grape; and dedzhe-pli, a black grape. Almost every family along the River Shakhe made between three and five earthenware jars of wine, described as ‘very decent, resembling the wines of southern France in flavour’.
The Englishman Bell, who lived in Circassia in 1837–38, noted that the Abazins and Ubykhs made wine similar in taste to Cypriot and other Greek wines. This assessment seems plausible, since throughout the winter our troops found grapes preserved among the dry vine leaves along the coast, suggesting that strong, full-bodied wines could have been produced.
Between the late 1840s and the early 1870s, agricultural development in the region came to a complete halt. Subsequent attempts to settle the coast found it so overgrown and depopulated that bringing the land back into cultivation immediately proved immensely difficult. Rampant nature resisted the efforts of people who, dwarfed by their surroundings, had begun cultivating the land in small groups or scattered settlements.
Despite these difficulties, viticulture began to advance as economic conditions changed in the northern part of the coastal region, following the arrival of the railway at Novorossiysk and an influx of capital and enterprising individuals.
The present phase of viticulture dates from 1871. That year, under the district agronomist F. I. Heyduk, the first organised planting took place on Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich’s Vardane estate. Around 2,000 Kakhetian vines were planted, of which only a third took root.
In 1872, Heyduk was sent abroad, from where he dispatched up to 20,000 Riesling and Portugieser vines, described as blue and black Portugieser (blaue und schwarze Portugiser). A vineyard was established at Abrau-Durso in 1874.
The attempts at Vardane failed because of careless planting. Vines were also planted at Dagomys, but grape-growing there was soon abandoned. At around the same time, several other winemaking pioneers established small vineyards in the central and southern parts of the district. They included Mamantov, Baron Steingel, Khristoforov, Safonov, Zubov and S. Zhigna, a settler in the village of Pilenkova.
Among private landowners in the Novorossiysk area, the pioneer was M. F. Penchul, who established a substantial winemaking enterprise on the Myskhako estate. He has since handed the estate over to the state for the establishment of a school to train horticultural workers.
According to Mikhail Fedotovich himself, the founding of this first enterprise in 1869 owed much to chance and to the involvement of D. V. Pilenko, the former head of the Black Sea District.
Established on a co-operative basis, the enterprise was placed under Penchul’s management. It became the nucleus of the comparatively extensive vineyards that subsequently developed at Myskhako, covering up to 30 desyatinas, or approximately 33 hectares.”
See also:
+ History and Development of the Culture of Viticulture and Winemaking in Abkhazia from Ancient Times, by Diana Akhba
+ The Production of Wine in Abkhazia: A Traditional Craft and an Industrial Business