How Friuli-Venezia Giulia came to make wine the way it does: the eras, families and rules that shaped the glass.
How Friuli-Venezia Giulia came to make wine the way it does: the eras, families and rules that shaped the glass.
181 BC to 452 AD
The Roman colony of Aquileia, founded 181 BC on the Adriatic coastal plain south of the Carso, became an imperial trade and wine hub on the Via Annia and the Via Postumia.
568 to 1300
The Lombards established Cividale del Friuli (Forum Iulii) as the capital of their first Italian duchy in 568 AD, with the duchy's vineyards on the Colli Orientali hills above the Natisone river.
1382 to 1918
The County of Gorizia passed to the Habsburg crown in 1500 and the Free Imperial City of Trieste from 1382, anchoring the Habsburg presence on the eastern Adriatic for over five centuries.
1880 to 1933
Phylloxera reached eastern Friuli through the 1880s and 1890s and destroyed the regional vineyard area within roughly two decades, mirroring the European pattern.
1956
Marco Felluga founded his Collio cellar at Capriva del Friuli in 1956 after the family's earlier Istrian holdings (lost to Yugoslavia after 1947) had to be rebuilt on Italian soil.
1968
The Italian Ministry of Agriculture granted DOC Collio Goriziano (now usually labelled simply Collio) in 1968. The disciplinare covers the hillside zone between Cormons, Capriva del Friuli, Dolegna del Collio, San Floriano del Collio and the Slovenian border, with Friulano, Ribolla Gialla, Pinot Grigio, Pinot Bianco, Sauvignon and Malvasia Istriana as the principal white varieties. The 1968 framework gave the Felluga, Schiopetto and Cormons producers the appellation identity that they built the region's white-wine reputation around.
1965 to 1970
Mario Schiopetto, who founded the Schiopetto cellar at the Bishop's farm of Spessa near Capriva del Friuli in 1965, introduced temperature-controlled white-wine vinification in stainless steel after a research trip to German and Austrian cellars. The technique gave Friuli's white grapes (Friulano, Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon) a clean, fruit-forward profile that became the modern Collio template. Mario's son Carlo and the next generation continue to run the cellar on Via Palazzo Arcivescovile today.
1970
DOC Colli Orientali del Friuli (today written Friuli Colli Orientali) was approved in 1970, covering the hill country around Cividale del Friuli, Manzano, Buttrio, Corno di Rosazzo and Prepotto.
1976 to 1977
Paolo and Dina Rapuzzi at Ronchi di Cialla in Prepotto planted Schioppettino, Refosco di Faedis, Verduzzo Friulano and Picolit on heritage cuttings in 1976 and 1977, after the variety Schioppettino had been excluded from the post-war list of permitted Friulian varieties and was near disappearance. The Rapuzzi replanting programme, supported by the Prepotto growers' association, kept the variety alive and led to the eventual Schioppettino di Prepotto sub-denomination of DOC Friuli Colli Orientali in 2008.
1986
The 1986 Italian methanol scandal (in which adulterated bulk wine killed 23 people in Lombardy and Piedmont) forced a national pivot from bulk-volume production to estate-bottled quality.
1995
Colli Orientali del Friuli Picolit was promoted to DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita) in 1995, recognising the rare sweet white wine made from the indigenous Picolit grape.
2001
Josko Gravner buried his first Georgian qvevri amphorae at the family cellar in Oslavia in 2001, after a 1990s research tour through Georgia studying traditional skin-contact whites.
2002 to 2005
Stanko Radikon at the neighbouring Oslavia cellar developed extended-maceration Ribolla Gialla, Jakot (Friulano), Pinot Grigio and the Oslavje blend through the early 2000s, working in parallel with Gravner.
2003 to 2008
Damijan Podversic above Gorizia and the Bensa family at La Castellada in Oslavia formalised parallel extended-skin-contact programmes through the early 2000s, working with Gravner and Radikon on the same ponca slopes.
2008
The European Court of Justice ruling in the long-running Hungary-Italy dispute over the Tokaj name required Friuli to drop the Tocai prefix on the variety previously labelled Tocai Friulano.
2008
The Schioppettino di Prepotto sub-denomination of DOC Friuli Colli Orientali was approved in 2008, recognising the Prepotto commune on the Slovenian border as the historical home village of the variety.
2010 to 2018
Paolo Vodopivec at Sgonico, Sandi Skerk and Benjamin Zidarich (also at Sgonico) extended the Oslavia extended-skin-contact programme to Carso Vitovska through the 2010s, with Vodopivec fermenting Vitovska in buried qvevri amphorae and Skerk and Zidarich working with limestone-carved cellars on the karst above Trieste. Edi Kante's 18-metre-deep cellar at Aurisina-Prepotto runs a parallel low-intervention but stainless-steel approach. The Carso cluster gave the orange-wine map a second epicentre with a different geology than the Oslavia ponca.
2016
The Friuli DOC umbrella appellation was created in 2016 to cover the entire regional territory under a simplified denomination, sitting above the existing zonal DOCs (Collio, Friuli Colli Orientali, Carso, Friuli Isonzo, Friuli Grave and the smaller Annia, Aquileia and Latisana). The 2016 reform consolidated marketing and labelling for export buyers while leaving the zonal DOCs in place for terroir-specific bottlings. The Consorzio DOC Friuli Venezia Giulia coordinates the umbrella.
2016
Stanko Radikon, the second of the Oslavia orange-wine founders alongside Josko Gravner, passed away in September 2016. His sons Sasa and Ivan continued the cellar with the same extended-maceration, low-sulphite programme that Stanko had developed through the early 2000s. The 500 ml standard-bottle format and the Ribolla Gialla, Jakot (Friulano), Pinot Grigio and Oslavje cuvees remain the cellar's core. The death marked the first generational transition in the Oslavia cluster.
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Wine tastings and winery visits in Friuli-Venezia Giulia (9) · Wine tours and day trips in Friuli-Venezia Giulia (6)
Peak wine-travel season in Friuli-Venezia Giulia is spring through autumn, with harvest the standout window.
classified-growth and grand-cru estates require booking days to weeks ahead; smaller family domaines often take walk-ins midweek.
most estates open 10:00 to 17:00 by appointment, often closed Sunday and Monday.
tipping is not expected at tastings; buying a bottle from the cellar door is the customary thank-you.
Ask the next local you meet what they would order. Friuli-Venezia Giulia rewards trust.