Riserva
- Minimum
- 1 year, including 6 months in bottle
Gavi’s long conversation with Cortese
A medieval vineyard lease and a seventeenth-century letter trace the wine’s roots in the Gaviese.
Vineyards were part of life around Gavi long before DOCG appeared on a label. A document dated June 3, 972, preserved in the State Archives of Genoa, records the bishop of Genoa leasing vineyards to two residents of Gavi. It is a glimpse of the area’s early winegrowing, rather than a record of the wine we drink today.
Cortese enters the written story later. Correspondence between the castle of Montaldeo and Marquis Doria in 1659 refers to vineyards planted entirely with Cortese. The grape remains the sole variety behind Gavi’s still and sparkling wines, linking the modern denomination to a much older local planting tradition.
