Researchers answer the long-standing issue of how, when and where wine and table grapevines were domesticated through the biggest genetic study of grapevine types ever conducted, which included samples from previously unrecorded specimens in private collections.
Despite the fact that wine and grapes play a significant societal role, it has been challenging to determine when and where table grapevines were tamed. This is primarily due to the lack of comprehensive DNA sequencing studies on grapevine types. As a consequence, there are a number of established theories in the literature that are still speculative. For instance, scientists once believed that the domestication of the cultivated wine grapevine (Vitis vinifera), from which all wine types descended, occurred in Western Asia before the development of cultivation. They also believed that wine grapevines were grown first, then table fruit grapevines. New research by Yang Dong and co-workers challenge both theories. According to their study, there were two grapevine domestication events based on the extensive genetic data they examined.
The new genetic evidence shows that the grapevine was domesticated in two regions — not only in Caucasus, as previously thought — and 3,000 years earlier. According to the research, the second region is none other than the countries known in modern times as Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine. What is even more impressive is that, while the domesticated vine in the Caucasus mainly stayed in the region that’s known today as Armenia, Georgia and Kazakhstan. The domesticated vines in the Levant made their way in different directions, most importantly toward Europe and through a series of accidental cross-breeding with wild vines, giving rise to the Vitis Vinifera grown today in Europe.
