Aversa

Styles

Principal grape varieties

Terroir

• The zone is entirely flat, with elevations ranging from 10 metres above sea level at Villa Literno to 101 metres above sea level at Qualiano, and with a predominantly south-facing vineyard aspect.
• The climate falls within the Mediterranean sphere of influence, with hot summers and mild winters and a mean annual rainfall of 702 millimetres calculated over the last twelve years, approximately 60% of which is concentrated in the autumn–winter period.
• The soils present, in their upper horizons, materials from the second Phlegraean period — both incoherent, such as pozzolana, and coherent or pseudo-coherent, such as yellow tuff (tufo giallo) — and, at depth, materials from the first Phlegraean period attributable to grey tuff.
• The layers intersected by boreholes fall into three pyroclastic formations: a shallow one of loose pozzolanic type down to 12 metres, a pseudo-lithoid tuffaceous one down to approximately 21 metres, and a sandy-ash type beyond that depth.
• The mineralogical composition of the pyroclastic rocks, dominated by products of the Campi Flegrei, is of trachytic alkaline character, classifiable within the potassic magmatic associations.
• The third formation, a sandy-gravelly volcanic ash (cinerite) sometimes alternating with tuffaceous horizons, can reach a thickness of several tens of metres and hosts the aquifer.

• Sante Lancerio, cellarmaster to Pope Paul III Farnese, records that the finest Asprinio was that of Aversa, used by the Pope as a thirst-quenching drink before retiring for the night.
• The vine is trained married to living supports, generally poplar, with tree-vine systems reaching heights of up to twenty metres according to the method known as Aversano.
• In 1839 Alexandre Dumas, in his Corricolo, described Asprinio as the only wine capable of pairing well with pizza and spaghetti.
• A wine register (Assisa del vino) dated 15 February 1640 records that the price of Asprinio was nine denari per carafe, a measure equivalent to approximately one litre.

Facts drawn from the specification's terroir-link section by automatic interpretation — see the source.

All appellations in Italy

Sources

• eAmbrosia register (EU) — File number PDO-IT-A0238
• Official trade body site — VITICA - Consorzio Tutela Vini Caserta