Saturday, February 17, 2007

WHATEVER YOU THINK OF THE CANAANITES, there's this to be said for them:
Andresky: Muscat love: Ancient grape's ancestors can be found all over the world

(Northwest Herald)

Muscat is a grape that's hard to describe.

Almost every great wine region in the world has some of its vines. Surprisingly, it makes a wine that actually tastes like ripe grapes. Its musk-like smell is the root of part of its name, and most table raisins come from its vine. More than 250 variations of muscat exist today.

Muscat is an ancient grapevine. Many molecular archeologists consider it to be the progenitor to all domestic grapes. The bridge between wild grapes and domesticated ones can be roughly calculated to somewhere between 1000 to 800 B.C.

Back then, Phoenicians lived along the Mediterranean Sea in what is now Lebanon, Syria and Israel. As sea-farers, Phoenicians carried wine to many points past Gibraltar, such as Cornwall and the west coast of Africa. The Phoenicians and their ancestors, the Canaanites, were responsible for transmitting the alphabet, arts and a wine culture. Their wine was known as "grape of the bees." It had a peculiar musk aroma and was believed to be muscat.

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