Bikaver
Before the twentieth century, the making of varietal wines was a rarity. This was partly because mixed planting would have made it difficult, and at the same time the natural conditions which varied from row to row would produce different qualities for the same cellar-owner; by mixing and processing these together it was possible to achieve consistent quality year on year.
And let us not forget one equally important factor: fashion did not call for varietal wines. Thus it was the consequence of a perfectly natural process that one real Hungarian wine speciality, BIKAVÉR BULL’S BLOOD, came into being, the fantasy name of which combined the red of the wine and the image of untamed natural strength symbolised by the bull.
While this wine had come into being when grapes were harvested and processed together, through the reconstruction (1880-1910) of vineyards after the phylloxera blight, with the coming of varietal planting, it was made by the blending of grapes that had been separately picked and processed. With changes and developments in the techniques of viticulturists and winemakers the varieties that went into Bull’s Blood also changed. Before the twentieth century kadarka and its variants constituted the basis of red wines in both Szekszárd and Eger, the two homes of Bull’s Blood. Under the influence of vineyard reconstruction there appeared in Eger kékfrankos, Médoc noir, kékoportó, and sometimes cabernet alongside kadarka. In Szekszárd the making of Bull’s Blood continued to be based on kadarka, supplemented by kékfrankos and merlot. Communist heavy industry, however, disqualified both kadarka and Médoc noir from ‘economic’ cultivation, replacing them with kékfrankos, zweigelt, and cabernet.
Changes have taken place, however, not only in the fundamental materials and approaches to winemaking, but also in nomenclature. For years – goodness knows why -only in Eger could wine be bottled under the name of Bull’s Blood, whereas the first literary reference to it comes in János Garay’s poem “Szekszárdi bordal” (Szekszárd wine-song) of 1846. Not long afterwards we find, also in connection with the name of Bull’s Blood: ‘So strong red wine is named, for example, that of Eger’. Which name takes precedence, however, has little significance in modern terms, and it suffices that the right of the excellent blended red wine of both regions to be known as Bull’s Blood is recognised. In recent years the winemakers of both regions have done a great deal to restore the standing of Bull’s Blood, which had become undeservedly diminished in the socialist period. They have laid down as a standard that it must consist of at least three wines, and in Szekszárd they endeavour to give kadarka the greatest possible emphasis. In the world of distinct, fashionable-sounding cuvées, however, it is not easy to re-establish so run-down a brand-name, which was seldom identified with quality in the communist period, but which now has a great future.
Authors: Zoltán Benyák, Tibor Dékány. Book: Hungarian wines and wineregions.
