SignificanceThe earliest biomolecular archaeological and archaeobotanical evidence for grape wine and viniculture from the Near East, ca. 6,000–5,800 BC during the early Neolithic Period, was obtained by applying state-of-the-art archaeological, archaeobotanical, climatic, and chemical methods to newly excavated materials from two sites in Georgia in the South Caucasus. Wine is central to civilization as we know it in the West. As a medicine, social lubricant, mind-altering substance, and highly valued commodity, wine became the focus of religious cults, pharmacopoeias, cuisines, economies, and society in the ancient Near East. This wine culture subsequently spread around the globe. Viniculture illustrates human ingenuity in developing horticultural and winemaking techniques, such as domestication, propagation, selection of desirable traits, wine presses, suitable containers and closures, and so on.

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The Near East and the Caucasus are commonly regarded as the original domestication centres of Vitis vinifera (grapevine), and the region continues to be home to a high diversity of wild and cultivated grapevines, particularly within Georgia. The earliest chemical evidence for wine making was recorded in Georgian Neolithic sites (6000-5800 BC) and grape pips, possibly of the domesticated morphotype, have been reported from several sites of about the same period. We performed geometric morphometric and palaeogenomic investigations of grape pip samples in order to identify the appearance of domesticated grapevine and explore the changes in cultivated diversity in relation to modern varieties. We systematically investigated charred and uncharred grape pip samples from Georgian archaeological sites. Their chronology was thoroughly assessed by direct radiocarbon dating. More than 500 grape pips from 14 sites from the Middle Bronze Age to modern times were selected for geometric morphometric studies. The shapes of the ancient pipe were compared to hundreds of modern wild individuals and cultivated varieties. Degraded DNA was isolated from three pips from two sites, converted to Illumina libraries, sequenced at approximately ten thousand SNP (Single Nucleotide Polymorphism) sites, and compared to a large 2 public database of grapevine diversity. The most ancient pip dates from the Middle Bronze Age (1900-1500 cal BC) and the domesticated morphotype is identified from ca. 1000 BC onwards. A great diversity of domesticated shapes was regularly seen in the samples. Most are close to modern cultivars from the Caucasian, southwest Asian and Balkan areas, which suggests that the modern local vine diversity is deeply rooted in early viticulture. DNA was successfully recovered from historic pips and genome-wide analyses found close parental relationships to modern Georgian cultivars.

Abstract. In 2014, the National Wine Agency of the Republic of Georgia initiated a three-year "Research Project for the study of Georgian Grapes and Wine Culture. Through collaborative research by Georgian and foreign institutions and researchers, the project aims to: stimulate research of Georgian viticulture and viniculture, through the lens of the country with the earliest tradition of grape domestication and winemaking; and to reconstruct the continuous development of viticulture and wine culture through time. The project advances the study of grape and wine culture by utilizing a multidisciplinary approach, including: archaeology, history, ethnography, molecular genetics, biomolecular archaeology, palaeobotany, ampelography, enology, climatology and other scientific fields. These studies are diachronic in their approach, beginning with the oldest Neolithic civilizations, to present day, creating a holistic understanding of the continuity and complexity of Georgian Wine Culture to help popularize Georgian Wine throughout the global wine market.

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