Wiener Gemischter Satz DAC

The capital of Austria is also one of the nine federal states and, with around 1.9 million inhabitants, the most populous and, at 415 square kilometres, the largest city in the country. Until 1986, Wien was also the capital of Lower Austria, the largest province in the east, when it was replaced by St. Pölten. The Danube flows through the city from north to south-east over a length of more than 20 kilometres. With over 600 hectares of vineyards, Wien is the city with the largest wine production worldwide.

History of Viennese viticulture

Viennese viticulture has a two-and-a-half-thousand-year history and is at least as old as the city itself when it was still a small settlement. Even the Celts and before them the Illyrians had practised viticulture in this area, which they called "Vedunia", in 500 BC, even before the Romans, as many finds such as wine barrels, pressing devices and grape seeds prove. Among others, also at the two vineyards Bisamberg and Nußberg, where many vineyards are still planted today. When Emperor Marcus Aurelius Probus (232-282) lifted the ban imposed by Emperor Domitian (51-96) on planting vines outside Italy, the legionaries in "Vindobona" began to cultivate vines and apply Roman methods. Today's large city with an area of over 400 km² is literally built on vineyards.

Even in the late Middle Ages, the largest parts of what later became Vienna's 21 districts were full of many vineyards, also in today's core area of the city within the so-called belt with districts from one to nine. There are documents attesting to vineyards in the present-day districts or boroughs of Stadtpark, Minoritenplatz, Rennweg, Alserbach, Alsegg, Matzleinsdorf, Linke Wienzeile, Weißgerberlände, Landstraße, Wieden and Mariahilf. Throughout the Middle Ages, viticulture was one of the main sources of income in Wien and many Viennese lived directly and indirectly from it. Even in the early Middle Ages, the innkeeping trade was considered a lucrative business and there is documentary evidence of wine tavern names from the 14th century.

Today's "Stubenviertel" in the 1st district got its name from the many wine taverns and guest gardens in this area. There were regulations about who was allowed to serve and sell wine and under what conditions, with protective measures against carousers and rowdies. For "boozing and brawling" was also part of the Viennese way of life at that time. The epistle Sauffnarr by the famous preacher Abraham a Sancta Clara (1644-1709) provides eloquent information about this. Strict laws were passed to protect wine. Strong competition arose from beer, and Duke Albrecht V (1397-1439) forbade the public serving of wine in 1430, saying that it might cause great harm to the town and our burghers who had wine wax.

From the middle of the 14th century, exports began to flourish and Viennese wine was sold to the Holy Roman Empire (Germany), Poland and Bohemia. At the beginning of the 15th century, vineyards in Wien and the surrounding area grew rapidly and almost completely displaced arable farming. Therefore, in 1426, Duke Albrecht V forbade the planting of new vineyards in order to secure the city's food supply. Emperor Ferdinand I. (1503-1564) designated wine as the first food of the cit Wieny in a city charter . The wine book by the clergyman Johann Rasch (1540-1612) describes in detail viticulture, wines, vineyard cultivation, cellar techniques and also drinking culture in this period.

Emperor Ferdinand III. (1608-1657) financed the defence of Vienna against the siege of the Swedes during the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) with wine, so to speak, by introducing a special wine tax of one groschen per stored bucket of wine in 1639. It was successful in repelling the Swedes. The captured Swedes were given a glass of the taxed wine as a mockery, which was called "Swedish wine". The best wines were stored in the three-storey imperial and royal court cellar deep below the castle. Hofkeller deep under the castle. The then Emperor Leopold I. (1640-1705) commissioned the construction of a giant barrel with a volume of 5,050 buckets, which was 285,000 litres of wine. A wine history of Vienna would be incomplete without mentioning the famous balladeer Lieber Augustin (lived in the 17th century). Worth reporting is the year 1443, when the wine was so extreme acid that allegedly even the tyres of the barrels were attacked. In the Viennese vernacular, which has always known how to "get to the heart of things", the term " Reifbeißer " was therefore created.

Viticulture in Vienna today

Wien is both a generic and specific wine-growing region. Together with Lower Austria and Burgenland, it forms the winegrowing region Weinland. Around 500 winegrowers cultivate vines mainly in the west and north of the city. There are vineyards in 9 of Vienna's 23 districts, namely in 1010 Innere Stadt, 1100 Favoriten, 1130 Hietzing, 1160 Ottakring, 1170 Hernals, 1190 Döbling, 1210 Floridsdorf, 1220 Donaustadt and 1230 Liesing. The majority of the 145 vineyards are located in Döbling (86 with over 300 hectares of vineyards ), Floridsdorf (33) and Liesing (11). An initiative Lagenklassifizierung (vineyard classification) was launched by the Winzervereinigung WienWein in 2017. The vineyards of the city Wien are divided into five major sites:

• Bisamberg (Floridsdorf with Strebersdorf, Stammersdorf, Groß-Jedlersdsorf)
• Maurerberg - until 2018 Georgenberg (Liesing with Mauer, Kalksburg, Rodaun)
• Kahlenberg (Döbling with Kahlenbergerdorf, Josefsdorf)
• Laaerberg (Favoriten with Oberlaa Stadt)
• Nußberg (Döbling with Nußdorf, Heiligenstadt)

Possible indications of origin are Riede (e.g. Alsegg, Preußen, Reisenberg, Rosengartl), Großlage (e.g. Kahlenberg), Katastralgemeinde (e.g. Grinzing, Stammersdorf) or Bezirk (e.g. Döbling, Hernals, Liesing).

A provincial law that came into effect in 2015 now stipulates that Vienna's vineyards must be managed; this means that they are, so to speak, under monument protection. All cultivators or property owners of Viennese vineyards are obliged to use them for viticultural purposes. Even areas that were cleared after the law came into force must be replanted after eight years at the latest. The winegrowers of the WienWein association had campaigned for this. In the past, Vienna's vineyards were always threatened by real estate speculation, because existing zoning and development plans offered too little protection. The law put an end to that.

A curiosity is the smallest vine yard in Vienna with only 75 vines on about 170 m² in a front garden of the Ringstrasse palace "Wiener von Welten" at Schwarzenbergplatz 2 in the 1st district. It was planted around 1900 by a caretaker from Transylvania. Every autumn, the first grapes are harvested by the Viennese mayor with media attention. The vinification is done by the Mayer winery on Pfarrplatz in Döbling. The harvest yields about 50 to 60 bottles of Gemischter Satz (mainly Grüner Veltliner), which are auctioned off in December on the occasion of the humanitarian campaign "Licht ins Dunkel".

The fact that Wien and wine are inseparable is also manifested by the fact that the two words are formed from the same letters. In the Middle Ages, in several German dialects (for example in Lower Rhine), the city was referred to as "Weyn". The well-known wine author Hugh Johnson writes that no city is as full of wine bliss as Wien . The Viennese Heuriger is known worldwide and many guests come to Wien(also) for this reason. In the 180 Heurigen establishments, the sale of high-quality bottled wines by the glass has also become established. Well-known wine villages with many Heurigen are Grinzing, Heiligenstadt, Jedlersdorf, Mauer, Neustift am Walde, Nussdorf, Oberlaa, Sievering, Stammersdorf and Strebersdorf.

Grape variety list

In 2016, the vineyards covered a total of 637 hectares of vines. Compared to 2009 with 612 hectares, there was an increase of 4%. The share of the clearly dominant white wine varieties amounts to 83%, the share of red wine varieties to 17%. The white mixed grape variety displaced Grüner Veltliner from the top position.

DAC system

The typical Viennese Heurigen wine is the Gemischter Satz, in which, according to an old tradition, different grape varieties are planted together in the vineyard and harvested and processed together. In 2009, the "Wiener Gemischte Satz" was accepted by the Slow Food Association as a "passenger" of the "Ark of Taste". It is thus one of the foods that should be strictly protected from the great threat posed by industrial agriculture and the food industry and preserved for future generations. The origin-controlled Wiener Gemischter Satz DAC has been available since the 2013 vintage.

In contrast to the other wine-growing regions, all Viennese quality wines may continue to be marketed as "Wiener Wein" (non-DAC quality wines from the Weinviertel, for example, may only be marketed with the generic wine-growing region of Lower Austria as their origin). A Gemischter Satz which does not comply with the above provisions must be marketed as a Landwein with the designation of origin Weinland.

Producers

Well-known Viennese wine producers with often also a Heurigen business are Bernreiter Peter, Christ Rainer, Cobenzl, Edlmoser Michael, Fuhrgassl-Huber, Göbel Hans-Peter, Hajszan-Neumann, Helm Robert, Hengl-Haselbrunner, Hofer Wolfgang, Kattus, Langes Irene, Lentner Karl, Mayer am Pfarrplatz, Mayer Vitikultur, Nössing Manuel, Pfaffl Roman, Reinprecht Hugo, Schilling Herbert, Stift Klosterneuburg, Wieninger, Winzerhof Leopold and Zahel. Well-known winegrowers' associations are Traditionsweingüter Österreich, Vienna Classic and WienWein.

Map: © ÖWM
Weingarten: By GuentherZ - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link
Nußberg: © ÖWM Gerhard Elze