Wine: Gifts to history

From the ancient town of Montepulciano, right in the heart of the Italian peninsula, came forth at least three great historical figures.

The first was the early Dominican saint, Agnes of Montepulciano. She started off as a Poor Sister of St. Clare—at that time known as the ‘sisters of the sack’ on account of their rough brown habits that seemed like sackcloth—having petitioned her parents to let her go and live under the rule written by St. Francis when she was only aged nine. Soon after taking her vows, she became famous in the area for her prayers of healing that liberated visitors to the convent of their physical ailments or mental torments. Apparently, she took on their sufferings in her own body, by which she grew ever weaker. After a dramatic vision of St. Dominic, she jumped ship and joined the Dominicans, taking all the nuns of the convent with her. We mostly know of her today because Raymond of Capua, St. Catherine of Siena’s confessor, had a great devotion to Agnes and promoted her cult throughout his ministry. She was finally canonised in 1726.

Montepulciano’s second great figure was the Renaissance poet and scholar Poliziano (‘the politician’), whose real name was Agnolo Ambrogini, the man who was perhaps responsible above anyone else for his century’s revival of classical Latin against what his contemporary Lorenzo Valla called the ‘barbarism’ of medieval Latin.

Poliziano, though largely ignored today, was a giant among the Florentines. Having sat at the feet of the inestimable Marsilio Ficino, who carefully inducted him into the mysteries of Hermes Trismegistus, he went on to make a name for himself first as household tutor to the Medici and later as a professor at Florence’s university, where he lectured on Neoplatonic metaphysics and the delivered courses on Ovid, Suetonius, Statius, Pliny the Younger, and Quintilian. Unfortunately, Poliziano was always haunted by accusations of sodomy, and with that smoke it seems there may have been some fire.

The third great figure to have come forth from the cobbled streets of Montepulciano was the Jesuit Doctor of the Church, St. Robert Bellarmine— famous among secularists as the persecutor of Galileo and the slayer of Giordano Bruno, whom as a magistrate he sent to the flames. He is also famous among Catholic X-Twitter-users as the hero of online integralists. Certainly, a divisive figure, none other than Karl Popper called Bellarmine ‘a better scientist than Galileo’. I personally have a great affection for Bellarmine because years ago I read his remarkable treatise on mystical theology, The Mind’s Ascent to God by the Ladder of Created Things. It is an astonishing book that certainly reminds its readers of the only reason— easily forgotten—for the Church’s existence: the union of her members with Jesus Christ.

I have never visited Montepulciano, but I have long wanted to visit largely on account of its importance for having gifted these exceptional figures to history. In turn, on a number of occasions, I have attempted to visit the place “through the bottle,” to use a Scrutonian phrase.

I should clear one thing up: the famous Montepulciano d’Abruzzo is a wine made nowhere near Montepulciano, but is rather made from Montepulciano grapes in the Abruzzo region, over a four-hour drive from the town of Montepulciano. As it happens, I have consistently found Montepulciano d’Abruzzo to make for very bad drinking. It is unfortunate, then, that the blended wine made from grapes near the town of Montepulciano—wine referred to as ‘Vino Nobile di Montepulciano’— is tarnished by its association with the eponymous Montepulciano d’Abruzzo. Indeed, this association is especially unfortunate given that, bizarrely enough, Vino Nobile di Montepulciano is never made with Montepulciano grapes, which are not grown anywhere near the town of Montepulciano. Such is the strange way of the world.

On the other hand, the ‘selected’ Vino Nobile di Montepulciano of a well-known supermarket that recently fell into my hands rightly deserves to be so tarnished. I smelled it, and its bouquet, if you can call it that, was solid wall paint. I passed it to my nine-year-old daughter, and she took a small sip and said, “It tastes like red wine, except this one is particularly horrid.” She passed the glass to my sevenyear-old son who in turn took a sip and said, “I prefer apple juice.” It came back to me, and I took my first sip only to experience what tasted like a mouthful of cheap red wine into which someone had poured some nail varnish remover.

A mix of mostly sangiovese with some merlot, I drank this heavy red wine with a frown, hoping that it would grow on me, especially after the introduction of a ribeye steak to the aquation. It didn’t. Moreover, it was the kind of wine of which I could sense a second glass would come with a headache.

I do hope to visit the town of Montepulciano one day, and enjoy its beautiful churches, glorious Renaissance town hall, and the striking Tarugi Palace made entirely from travertine limestone. And if I do ever visit this town of tremendous historical importance, there I shall drink a beer.