We now bring to you a background on wines with special reference to Rome and its association with wines. A long table, a bottle of wine, and a glass kept well topped up. Some may go for fine vintage wine, others for cheap, rough red, but all good Frenchmen, rich and poor, love their wine and mistrust those who drink only water. France not only leads the world in both the production of wine and its consumption per head, it can also boast of finest wines.
Wine is full of symbolism.
The Greeks paid due respect to their god of wine, Dionysus, son of Zeus, and the Romans had an equivalent in Bacchus. It seems to have been consumed by all and sundry, and played a major part in all those Roman orgies described by historians from Pliny to Suetonius. Yet in ancient Rome it was strictly forbidden for women to drink wine. History does not record whether he was a wine drinker himself. In Christian times, the need for communion wine led to the monasteries playing an important role in the development of viticulture.