Towering Over the World’s Oldest Cellar

A new high-rise in the Israeli city of Nahariya is being built over the “world’s oldest wine cellar”. The 3,700-year-old cellar was uncovered in 2013 in a Canaanite palace. Archaeologists found forty ceramic jars capable of holding thirteen gallons of wine each. Thankfully, the construction company building the high-rise will be incorporating the cellar into a mini-museum rather than destroying it.

China has the second-most acreage planted with vines in the world.

Answer: True.

In 2015, China overtook France as the second-largest wine grower in the world by vineyard area (Spain is still in first place). In the early 1950s, China had only about 8000 acres (3,200 hectares) of grapes. By 2016 it had two million (847,000). This 250% growth has been helped by technological advances as well as climate change. According to data from the Chinese Meteorological Administration, average temperatures in China have risen 0.5-0.8C in the last century, making it possible to cultivate wine grapes 60-100 miles further north. In the arid mountainous region of Ningxia some 550 miles west of Beijing, for example, the government has reclaimed desert-like expanses, irrigated them with water from the Yellow River, and planted them with cabernet sauvignon, marselan, and merlot. Ningxia has been called “The Napa Valley of China.”

“No! We’ve only been growing cab franc here for 900 years. There is still so much to learn.”

—Mathieu Baudry of Domaine Bernard Baudry
Upon being asked if he would consider growing red grapes other than cabernet franc in Chinon (Loire Valley) France.

Towering Over the World’s Oldest Cellar

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