Ca’ Bembo Friuli Grave Merlot 2009
Friuli-Venezia Giulia is an autonomous region of Italy with special statute.
In the 6th century A.D., the Alpine Slavs, ancestors of present-day Slovenes, settled the eastern areas of the region. They settled in the easternmost mountainous areas of Friuli, known as the Friulian Slavia, as well as the Kras Plateau and the area north and south from Gorizia. In the 12th and 13th century, they also moved closer to the city of Trieste.
Friuli became Venetian territory in 1420, while Trieste and Gorizia remained under the Austrian Empire. Pordenone was a “corpus separatum”, under Austrian influence until 1515, when it also fell under the Venetian rule. With the peace treaty of Campoformido in 1797, Venetian domination came to an end and Friuli was ceded to Austria. After the period of domination by Napoleon, which affected also Trieste and Gorizia, it again became part of the Austrian Empire and was included in the Lombard-Veneto Kingdom, while Gorizia was merged with the Illyrian Kingdom and Trieste, together with Istria, became part of the Austrian Coastal Region. The enlightened policy of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire in the 18th and 19th centuries encouraged an economic flourishing, making Trieste the empire’s port. The outcome of the war of independence brought Friuli alone into the unified Kingdom of Italy.
After the First World War, these border lands were again united, although Venezia Giulia, in particular, was the subject of many contradictions regarding the borders.
The Second World War led to the Anglo-American Administration in Trieste until the border was fixed with the Memorandum of London in 1954. When Trieste was reunited with Italy, the Autonomous Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia could finally be established. The Italian Constitution assigns it the status of Region with a Special Statute. However, Friuli – Venezia Giulia obtained administrative autonomy and the special statute only in 1963. The reasons for this “constitutional delay” are interwoven with the international problems of the second postwar period and with those deriving from the region’s “diversity” – the different historical, ethnic, and linguistic components that go to make up this area. In 1975, the Treaty of Osimo was signed in Osimo, definitively dividing the former Free Territory of Trieste between Italy and Yugoslavia
The Ca’ Bembo Merlot 2009 that I have was produced by Principi di Porcia e Brugnera, Soc. Agr. – Azzano Decimo, Pordenone, Friuli-Venezia Giulia. To be honest, having just had a glass of an RSA Pinotage from Stellenbosch, I don’t fancy the Ca’ Bembo Merlot 2009 at all! But undoubtedly the world is a much better place for the inclination of the human race to make wine wherever they are, and the Ca’ Bembo Merlot 2009 is certainly drinkable. Much better to make wine than war! I understand that Friuli-Venezia Giulia is mainly known for its whites, which I have not tasted. A pleasure for another day.
Website: www.porcia.com