Schloss Johannisberg

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Schloss Johannisberg
Location Johannisberg, Germany
Founded 1100
Known for Schloss Johannisberg Riesling
Varietal Riesling
Website http://www.schloss-johannisberg.com
Distribution national
Tasting open to the public

Schloss Johannisberg is a winery in the Rheingau, Germany, that has been making wine for over 900 years.[1]. The winery is most noted for its claim to have "discovered" of late harvest wine.

Contents

[edit] History

A mountain on the north bank of the River Rhine near Mainz has been associated with the Church and with winemaking since the Dark Ages, when Ludwig der Fromme ("the Devout") made 6000 litres of wine during the reign of Charlemagne. In 1100, Benedictine monks completed a monastery on the Bischofsberg ("Bishop's") mountain, having identified the site as one of the best places to grow vines.[2] 30 years later they built a Romanesque basilica in honour of John the Baptist, and the hill became known as Johannisberg (John's mountain). As such the monsatery was a prime target for the Anabaptists in the Peasants' War of 1525, and it was destroyed.

In 1716 Konstantin von Buttlar, Prince-Abbot of Fulda bought the estate, started construction of the baroque palace, and in 1720 planted Riesling vines, making it the oldest Riesling vineyard in the world.[1] The estate changed hands several times during the Napoleonic Wars, but in 1816 the Holy Roman Emperor, Francis II, gifted it to the great Austrian statesman Prince von Metternich.[1]

The estate remains in the hands of the Metternich family today. The buildings were almost completely destroyed by air raids on Mainz in 1942, and and after the war took twenty years to reconstruct.[1] There are currently about 80 acres of vineyard.

[edit] Late harvest wines

Tradition has that a messenger from the Abbey of Fulda was late in bringing papers to give the workers permission to harvest the grapes. One story is that he was robbed en route.[citation needed] By this time the grapes had become affected with the "noble rot" Botrytis cinerea. The rotted grapes were then given to the local peasants who ended up making wine of high quality.[3] In 1775, Schloss Johannisberg made the first Spätlese level Riesling followed by an Auslese level wine in 1787[4] and an Eiswein in 1858.[1] Unfortunately for the Germans, the Tokay classification of 1730 relied in part on an area's propensity to noble rot, which suggests that the Hungarians got there first.

Historically the estate used different colour seals for different ripenesses of grapes. These classifications were used as the basis for the new German wine classification of 1971, thus :

Seal Classification
Yellow Qualitätswein
Red Kabinett
Green Spätlese
Pink Auslese
Pink-gold Beerenauslese
Gold Trockenbeerenauslese
Blue Eiswein

[edit] Geology

The 35ha of vineyards consist of a loam-loess topsoil lying on a Taunus quartzite.

[edit] Visitors

The estate offers guided tours with tastings, a wine bar, shop, and various special events.

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ a b c d e A History of Schloss Johannisberg
  2. ^ Wine Spectator Magazines Wine in Northern Europe September 30th, 2006 pg 124
  3. ^ A Short History of Riesling
  4. ^ Karen MacNeil The Wine Bible Workman Publishing 2001 page 540 ISBN 1-56305-434-5


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