Wine was the Greeks' favourite drink. Its taste, colour and alcoholic content had to be strong. Following the Egyptian custom, it was diluted with water in the proportion of 50%-70%. Only disreputable people, like the barbarians in the taverns at the Port of Piraeus in Athens, drank their wine straight. Wine was stored in vessels sprinkled with resin from conifer trees, giving it a particular aroma, still found today in the white wine called Retsina. Honey or aromatic herbs were sometimes added to preserve it. The wines of Lemnos, Pramnos and Chios were famous and widely diffused.

The Greeks in Basilicata

Basilicata is the territory, situated above the Greek colonies along the arc of the Ionian Sea, where the Oenotrians settled during the Middle Bronze Age. According to Herodotus, Oenotria was the land where grapevines grew tied to poles or reeds, instead of being supported by trees as in Campania and in Etruria, or on pergolas, as in the Brindisi area, or crawling on the ground as was the custom in Asia Minor.

Grape-growing on the Ionian coast

The first Greek colonists to arrive in southern Italy probably brought with them wine and grapevines. In the Ionian inland area, the site of Incoronata documents the presence of the grapevine, which likely grew around Metaponto as well. Over the remainder of the Italic soil, starting from the Iron Age, the characteristics of the grape seeds found increasingly resemble those of the cultivated grapevine, confirming the transition from merely gathering wild fruit to real cultivation.

Dionysus and wine: banqueting implements

Italic grave goods abound in implements and containers for preparing the customary drink, made by diluting wine in water and adding grated cheese and honey. Cheese-graters and kraters were thus objects symbolic of the symposium.

Ceramic tableware

Around the krater are wine cups of various types. The most important is the tall-stemmed kantharos; then come skyphoi, deep cups on low stems, and kylikes, broad shallow cups, either long- or short-stemmed. Ewers of medium size were used for pouring, such as the oinochoe (from the Greek oinos = wine, and cheo = pour), and the olpe, as well as dippers and single-handled jugs.