Wine Law

2 Wine labels appear to date back as far as the 16 th century BCE in Egypt. Evidence dating back to 1352 BCE, from King Tut’s burial site (unearthed in 1922), indicates that the ancient Egyptians were the first who actually placed on amphorae – not yet bottles –, etchings and seals as a way to make trade easier, but also to provide information about the year, type and quality of the wines. They were thus labelling their wines detailing the vintage, the growing region or vineyard and the winemaker. The labelling wines in the Persian Empire originated due to necessity and the many varieties of wine that were being produced. The etching method was used until 1600, when in England heavy glass bottles, hermetically closed with cork stoppers, began to be used mainly for the bottling of Champagne. The advent of glass bottles created the need for more precise identification of the wines themselves: this is how what we commonly call the “label” was born. The oldest label is considered to be the one written by the Benedictine monk Dom Pierre Pérignon, who introduced the winemaking method known as Métode Champenoise . In order not to confuse the vintages and the vineyards of origin, the monk labelled the bottles with a parchment tied to the neck of the bottle with a string. By the 18 th century, wine trade in Europe was booming, with so-called labels printed on parchment and tied to the bottlenecks with string, much like the hang tags we still see today. By 1798, lithography had been invented, and all wine labels could be printed in mass quantities, and leading to increased use of colour and more emphasis on artistic design. Moreover, during the 1970s, European winemakers would begin to work with famous artists (Picasso and Chagall, to name a few) to create awe-inspiring bottle labels that would properly represent the quality and unique artistry of the product within.