The cultivation of vines in the Bolgheri DOC area in Castagneto Carducci has very ancient origins, and testimonies of its presence derive from the Etruscans and then from the Romans. More recent evidence dates back to the medieval period due to the presence of numerous monasteries and ecclesiastical domains. Starting from 1790 new facilities were set up, especially near Bolgheri, thus increasing the wine production of the area's wines. In 1816 the first experimental vineyards were built at Capanne di Castiglioncello, where later the first Sassicaia vineyard was born, and in the Castelluccio fields. The viticultural choices were made not only on the basis of the terroir, but above all on the basis of the French wine culture with particular attention to the vinification methods and the vines used in France: to confirm this the choices made by Count Guido Alberto and Mazzanti were precisely addressed to French vines including Gamay, Cabernet and Syrah. The official consecration of the Sassicaia wine takes place in 1978 when the Decanter magazine publishes a comparative tasting of cabernet of the world and Sassicaia takes first place. Subsequently the 1985 vintage of Sassicaia competes, in a tasting of the Grand Jury Européen, with the Grands Crus of Bordeaux and obtains the maximum recognition. But the Sassicaia wine does not remain an isolated phenomenon and, starting from the 1980s, it is joined by numerous other wines from famous companies that obtain a huge harvest of awards.
The vines codified as an ampelographic base for the Bolgheri DOC, both black and white, proved to be the best qualitative choice for the area in this sense. The training system must not be expanded, but espalier with spurred cordon or guyot pruning, the planting layout must have a sufficiently high density to contain production excesses, as well as the pruning system. The practices related to the processing of wines are those consolidated in the area for red winemaking, adequately differentiated for the base wines and the superior type, referring to the latter to more structured wines, whose processing involves certain periods of aging and aging in mandatory barrel and bottled. For the vinification in white and rosé the practices are suitable for obtaining fresh sapid and harmonic wines.
