Abkhazia

The Black Sea coast north-west of the Enguri: a narrow strip between the Caucasus range and the sea, humid subtropics with 1,300–3,500 mm of rain a year. Soils are humus-carbonate and brown forest soils with limestone inclusions, yellow and red earths, and alluvium in the river valleys. The main growing districts are Gudauta and Gulripshi; in the hills vines are still trained as maglari — up a supporting tree, roughly 10×10 m per plant, neither irrigated nor buried for winter. Abkhazia is one of the homelands of the domesticated vine, and its native varieties are genetically closest to the Georgian ones. Little survives of the fifty-odd historical cultivars: a search begun in 2004 recovered 15 of them, 10 were propagated, and the collection is held at Achadara near Sukhumi. Kachich, Auasyrkhua, Amlakhu, Azhapsh and Agbizh lead the revival — some 50,000 vines have been planted in recent years. The region has no appellations at all: the Georgian register does not extend to this territory, and Abkhazian wine is not certified by the National Wine Agency. Five or six industrial producers operate here, and some of the volume brands were historically bottled from imported bulk wine — so a name on the label is backed by nothing but the reputation of the estate behind it. No wines from this region appear in the catalogue: they are not sold in Georgian retail, and a listing with neither price nor merchant tells a buyer nothing. The zone itself, its grapes and its history are unaffected — they are what this page is about.