The Islamic Golden Years of a Lebanese Wine?
Afghanistan, Iran, and Saudi Arabia claim to be Islamic states, and while they defer from each other in many aspects, they unanimously prohibit both the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages on their territories. We may be tempted to view such radical opposition to alcohol as deeply rooted in Islamic history, but no, outright prohibition of alcohol by an Islamic state is a modern phenomenon. One or two centuries ago, it would have been possible for an alcoholic beverage to be produced within an Islamic state and achieve wide success.
The Ottoman Empire was a formidable Islamic dominion: it lasted 600 hundred years until the early 20th century, and once encompassed North Africa, Southeast Europe, the Near East, and parts of the Middle East. It was unabashedly Islamic, and its rulers claimed the title of caliph (leader of the Muslim world).
Within this empire, was the tiny territory of Lebanon,[1] which, in a time when no one spoke of marketing, had an internationally recognized brand of wine. It was known in Lebanon and abroad by its French name, “Vin d’Or”, meaning “Golden Wine”, because of its distinctive yellow color. [2] Europeans travelers sang its praise, while poets wrote verses on the exquisitly sweet wine. According to an 19th century English advertisement it was “recommended by the best medical authorities in Paris as the Best Tonic”. Merchants from Europe looked to secure the exclusive imports of Vin d’Or vintages to then distribute across the continent. Lebanon’s Christian community produced, drank, and exported this famed golden wine with the full knowledge and consent of the Ottoman authorities[3]. And so it was that Vin D’Or was able to thrive inside an Islamic dominion.
Vin D’Or silently died for no obvious reasons, and present-day Lebanon no longer produces it. But the wine’s story remains an odd reminder of a pre-modern era when the golden years of Lebanese wine were also its Islamic ones.
[1] At the time, the term “Lebanon” referred to a subset of the modern Lebanese territory. Nowadays, most of Lebanese wine is produced in the Beqaa Valley, a region that was not part of “Lebanon” during Ottoman times. Vin D’Or was mostly produced in Lebanon’s Keserwan region.
[2] It was sometimes also called by the Italian equivalent, “Vino D’Oro”.
[3] Every once and a while, I read articles claiming that the Ottomans banned wine and destroyed vineyards in Lebanon. I have not been able to find original sources that substantiate these claims.
