The Wines

The provenance of Syrah was long disputed. Competing mythologies placed its origins variously in the Ancient Greek (now Sicilian) state of Syracuse, or alternatively the Iranian city of Shiraz. When James Busby took vines from France to Australia in 1831 the locals chose to call them Shiraz, and have continued to do so ever since.
What was not disputed was that its natural home for centuries was the Northern Rhone valley in southeast France. DNA typing in 1998 at the University of California at Davis established that Syrah was a cross between Dureza and Mondeuse Blanche, two relatively obscure varieties from regions neighbouring the Rhone, effectively debunking the stories of eastern origins.

Establishing the parentage of the vine does not, however, date its origins. In AD77 Pliny the Elder referred to a dark-skinned grape that grew at Vienne, which may well have been Syrah. Its wine was lauded by Plutarch. By the 18th century it was the dominant variety grown in the Northern Rhone, most famously on the hill above Tain-l’Hermitage where the wines were so highly regarded that the top Bordeaux chateaux used them to improve their own.
Today we associate Syrah with the wines of Hermitage, Cornas and Cote-Rotie, and as a significant component of Chateauneuf-du-Pape, Gigondas and Cotes du Rhone. In Australia, under the Shiraz label, it is the major component of the country’s leading red wines including Penfolds Grange and Henschke Hill of Grace. In New Zealand the story has only just begun.

The hillside plantings at Hermitage are shared by many famous names, some of whom have managed the same vines for many generations; names like Chave, Chapoutier, Jaboulet, Delas and Marc Sorrel.