![]() ![]() The main definitions of Spain's DO (Denominación de Origen), its wine quality control system, in ascending order of quality are: Recent years have some vast sums pouring into new wineries, but with Spain currently the worst recession-hit European nation, many of these look set to fold, restoring something of a natural balance. The early 1980s saw a veritable technological revolution with the advent of stainless steel. Later still was the French intervention in Rioja though the true winemaking revolution comes politically after Franco's death in 1975. ![]() Thus Jerez/Sherry is to Spain as Port is to Portugal, and merits its own dedicated guide. Later, in the sixteenth century, after Christopher Columbus discovered America, the Sherry town of Sanlúcar de Barrameda became an important transatlantic trading port and the wines from the area are alleged to have been the first to enter America. Many foreign merchants became involved, filling the vacuum left by the Jews. After the final vanquishing of the Moors and the expulsion of the Jews production steadily increased as demand rose in the expanding colonies. The customs of the Christian population were tolerated, including the production and sale of wine, which, although only on a reduced scale, was enough to keep the sector active. The latter, despite the prohibitions of the Koran and the consequent symbolic uprooting of many Spanish vineyards to produce raisins, were even by today's standards quite enlightened. Hispanic success was such that strict new planting limitations had to be imposed on the colonies in an effort to protect native producers. Indeed, by the second century AD Rome alone had worked its way through some 20 million amphorae of Spanish wine - ranging from the sweet wines of Málaga, through the claretes (or light reds) of Amandi in Galicia (a favourite, particularly with spiced lamprey, of the Emperor Augustus), to the Catalan reds of Tarragona and whites of Alella. The former provided not just roads, aqueducts, and amphitheatres but thirst and a major export market. The foundations of its infrastructure were essentially the creation of its two primary foreign masters: the Romans (from the third century BC to the fourth/fifth century AD) and the Moors (from 711 till 1492). Its history is intricate and complicated, and Spain did not even begin to come together as a nation until the late fifteenth century. Spain is a large country of tremendous diversity, and even the briefest glance at its physical geography, its dramatic mountain chains in particular, will serve to explain the major regional differences created by so many natural barriers. ![]()
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