Even before the birth of Christ, the Rhaetian people were already using wooden barrels for their wine in what is now modern-day South Tyrol. When the first transalpine road came into existence with the “Via Claudia Augusta”, pilgrims and merchants brought not only new knowledge regarding the topic of wine-making back to South Tyrol from their travels, but also improved vine seedlings. Beginning in the eighth century AD, Frankish and Bavarian monasteries acquired wineries in climatically favourable South Tyrol and called the first wines “Potzner” and “Traminer” after their towns of origin (Bolzano/Bozen and Termeno/Tramin). The Lagrein variety was first mentioned by the peasant leader Michael Gaismair in 1525.
South Tyrol’s wine-making was especially supported under the Hapsburg empire. The number of grape varieties increased, and Riesling and the Burgundy varieties moved into South Tyrol wineries, as too, unfortunately, did the Phylloxera epidemic that arrived from America. Starting around 1980, South Tyrol wine-making began to experience a sustained upswing thanks to modernization and consistent ideas about quality. Today, the Alpine character in combination with the charm of the Mediterranean make South Tyrol wines more popular than ever before, both throughout Italy and abroad.