"Day after day, the vineyards stretch their roots into the earth. The wines mature over time. And people are also refined in the territory. My family has refined itself in 10 generations on Etna."
The history of my family is linked to that of the district of Villagrande. If you like to leaf through ancient books, you will see that my ancestors lived and worked on these lands as early as the end of the 1600s. At the beginning of the 1700s, the bishop of Catania entrusted the Nicolosi Asmundo family with the task of transforming the impervious lands of Etna from "a horrid and uncultivated place to a delightful garden". My ancestors arrived here on a cart, looked around and began to roll up their sleeves, to cultivate the hard lava soil of the volcano. Then in 1727 it happens like in fairy tales. Emperor Charles VI of Habsburg, King of Naples, confers on Don Carmelo Nicolosi the title of Baron of Villagrande. So my family puts down more and more solid roots on the slopes of Etna.
The bond with the grape becomes indissoluble, giving rise to the oldest history of vineyard cultivation on these lands, which continues today. Generations pass, from the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies we move on to the newborn Italy. Italy was 8 years old when in 1869 Paolo Nicolosi created the new winemaking and aging cellar. And it is my great-great-grandfather Paolo who is the first to use a separate vinification for white and red grapes. Until then, on Etna as in most of Italy, it was customary to vinify the grapes all together, without distinction of vines and colors. He thought otherwise. He wanted to create different wines to enhance the different grapes and their specificities. The one Paolo created was the ancestor of today's Etna Bianco Superiore. In 1968, when the D.O.C. Etna, the first Denomination of Controlled Origin in Sicily, was recognized, the specification was written by my father Carlo Nicolosi Asmundo, university professor of oenology and food techniques at the University of Catania.
We have written an important page in the history of Etna wine. And the story continues.
Today Marco Nicolosi, as Oenologist and Production Manager, continues to keep alive the commitment to the territory with the aim of respecting and enhancing the family's heritage and the peculiarities of the wine-growing area. The goal of the company, the family and the staff is to share the natural heritage of Etna, to transfer the love and devotion of a unique and special place.
