Wine myths
Montepulciano means one thing
“Montepulciano is a grape, so Vino Nobile di Montepulciano is made from it.”
Montepulciano is both a grape and a Tuscan town, and they have nothing to do with each other. Vino Nobile di Montepulciano is made from Sangiovese, not from the Montepulciano grape.
The full answer
The Montepulciano grape is grown mainly in Abruzzo, on the Adriatic side of Italy, and gives the soft, dark, everyday red sold as Montepulciano d’Abruzzo.
Montepulciano is also a hill town in southern Tuscany, roughly 200 kilometres away, whose wine is Vino Nobile di Montepulciano — made predominantly from Sangiovese, the same variety as Chianti and Brunello.
So a bottle labelled "Montepulciano d’Abruzzo" tells you the grape and the region. A bottle labelled "Vino Nobile di Montepulciano" tells you the town, and the grape is Sangiovese. The word is doing a completely different job in each.
Adding to the confusion, the town of Montalcino — home of Brunello — is nearby and also makes Sangiovese, and the two Tuscan names are frequently swapped.
Montepulciano genuinely is a grape name, so a reader who assumes it is one is right half the time.
Why the belief persists
Italian labelling names places, grapes and both, with no way to tell from the label which convention is in use.
What producers in a particular place conventionally do. Distinct from a regulated requirement: convention is what happens, regulation is what is compulsory, and confusing the two is one of the commonest errors in regional wine writing.
What would settle it: Documented practice in the region diverging from the stated convention.
Sources
Sources consulted
- Italian DOP and IGP wine register — Ministero dell’agricoltura, della sovranità alimentare e delle foreste (MASAF)
- Vitis International Variety Catalogue (VIVC) — Julius Kühn-Institut, Institute for Grapevine Breeding Geilweilerhof