The recorded history of wine in Israel is well documented in ancient texts. The biblical book of Genesis references Noah’s planting of a vineyard following the recession of the great flood. Later, Moses, en route from Egypt, receives a cluster of grapes from the “land of milk and honey,” referencing the vinous bounty of the Promised Land. Archaeological findings verify these viticultural reports, with abundant evidence of ancient winemaking in what is modern-day Israel.
The wines of Israel and the Levant achieved particular acclaim in the final centuries before the Common Era and were exported around the Mediterranean basin. In 70 CE, the ancient Romans sacked Jerusalem and the Second Temple, dispersing the Jewish population—and the region’s viticulture knowledge. The Arab conquest in the mid-seventh century further suppressed winemaking, due to economic hardships and alcohol being forbidden under Islamic law.
In the 19th century, as Jews returned from the diaspora, winemaking too reemerged in Ottoman-controlled Palestine. Much of this was home winemaking, but the walled Old City of Jerusalem counted 26 wineries within its bounds during this period—2 of them continue to produce wine today. Indigenous grapes were used, as were French grapes new to the region, such as Carignan. Baron Edmond de Rothschild’s investment in the 1880s is generally considered the watershed moment bringing about the modern Israeli wine industry. A member of a wealthy Jewish European family and owner of Bordeaux first growth Château Lafite, Rothschild received requests for aid from the young Zionist villages Zikhron Ya’akov and Rishon LeZion. Seeing viticulture as a viable pathway to self-sufficiency, he sent French experts to help establish vineyards. Rothschild himself arrived in 1887. Taken with the landscape and potential near Mount Carmel, he dedicated further resources to transform
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