Sassicaia - For Love of Wine and Horses

Sassicaia is one of Italy’s most famous wines. It is the original Super Tuscan and responsible for bringing Italian wines into the modern era. Like all great Italian wines, this one also has a history.

The Incisa della Rocchetta family, the producers of Sassicaia, have a long history in Italy. The earliest records of the family date back to before the year 1000. But it is with the Marquis Leopoldo Incisa della Rocchetta where our story begins. Marquis Mario Incisa della Rocchetta is the creator of Sassicaia and Leopoldo was his great-grandfather.

Leopoldo spent 28 years working as an administrator in the Imperial government of Lombardy-Veneto. In 1840, he was paralyzed by illness and had to retire. He was 48. Not wanting to be idle, he began studying viticulture. In a memoir from the mid-1800’s, he spoke about the successful results of the French varietals planted at the Piedmont estate. In 1862, he composed his first catalogue of the 175 varietals of vines that he had growing in pots. In 1869, he composed a second catalogue. In this one he had Cabernet Sauvignon listed at #93 and Cabernet Franc at #145. According to his writings, he figured them to be the most valuable of all the varietals that he had introduced. Leopoldo died in 1871. Unfortunately, his nursery did not survive for long after his death, but his catalogue did. It became an invaluable resource for his great-grandson Mario.

Mario Incisa della Rocchetta grew up in Piedmont then Rome. He fought in the first World War as part of the cavalry and afterwards he enrolled in the faculty of Agriculture in Pisa. He brought the horse he rode during the war with him. During this time, he became involved in the local equestrian community and it was through his love of thoroughbred horses that he met Clarice della Gherardesca. She was the daughter of Giuseppe della Gherardesca and the American Harriet Taylor.
Mario and Clarice married in 1930 in the old church in Bolgheri then settled in Rome and restored one of the properties owned by Mario’s mother. It was here that they began to raise thoroughbreds and the most famous Italian racehorse of all time, Ribot, came from their stable.

After World War II, Mario and Clarice decided to move back to Bolgheri where Clarice, along with her sister, had inherited Tenuta delle Capanne. Bolgheri is in the Livornese Maremma. It has one of the most diverse eco-systems of southern Europe. Mario decided to invest in his wife’s family property. Money wasn’t a problem thanks to Ribot’s earnings, both in prize-money and stud fees. Due to the war, much of the property was in a state of neglect and one of Mario’s first priorities was to re-organize the agricultural portion of Clarice’s inheritance. This was Tenuta di San Guido.

Mario had actually been working on his pet project since 1942, but it was on terraces hidden amongst holm oaks and the trees of Castiglioncello, that the adventure of Sassicaia began. Mario loved the French clarets he drank in his youth. In the early 1930’s he experimented with Pinots at his estate in Piedmont. After further study of French reds, he determined that Pinot was better suited to Northern Italy and Cabernet to the center. He actually preferred the bouquet and texture that came from Cabernet based wines. It was in 1942 that he began taking soil samples and examining sun, wind and sea exposures. The local wines being produced at this time lacked elegance and often had a ‘brackish’ character due to the proximity of the vines to the sea. Mario chose a piece of land 350 meters above sea level (1148 feet) with south-east exposure that was sheltered from the sea winds. He fermented his wine in open-topped wooden vats and right from the beginning, aged it in oak. At that time, it stayed in oak for 5-6 years.

This wine however, was not appreciated by the locals who were unaccustomed to the flavors of Cabernet. Plus, they wanted to drink the wine in the spring following the vintage like they did their local wines. Mario knew that Cabernet could not possibly be ready that soon. The grassy and tannic qualities that so disgusted the experts were in fact good qualities that just needed time to express themselves. Annoyed by all the negativity, Mario felt defeated and tried to forget all about his wine. 10 years later, in the early 1960’s, with the encouragement of his son Nicolò, they opened some bottles of the 1949 and 1950 vintages out of curiosity for a friend who was a wine and food connoisseur. The wine was enthusiastically received and Mario decided to try again.

He created a second vineyard 100 meters (328 feet) above sea level and ran the vines north-south so that both sides received the same amount of sun. With some help from his Antinori cousins and specifically their enologist Giacomo Tachis, more new vineyards were planted and the most promising, Sassicaia, gave it’s name to the first Incisa-Antinori label in 1968. (The name comes from the pebbly soil in the vineyard. Sasso is the Italian word for stone).

With Antinori’s involvement, the wine was no longer in Mario’s hands. It reached worldwide success and won many blind tastings against the best Cabernets of France, California & Australia. One journalist called it a ‘Super Tuscan’ and the term stuck. Philippe de Rothschild wrote Mario. “Dear Colleague, your wine is wild and savage but brilliant………” Mario was thrilled to be referred to as a colleague.

Mario did not set out to make a wine that would change the panorama of Italian winemaking. He just wanted a wine for himself, his family and a few friends. Sassicaia is a blend of 85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Cabernet Franc. This was what his great-grandfather, Leopoldo Incisa della Rocchetta recommended. Sassicaia was labeled as a table wine until 1994 when it was granted a DOC designation. A unique distinction for a wine produced only by one single winery.

Sassicaia made the Bolgheri area famous and without it there would be no DOC Bolgheri and no Etruscan Coast Wine Trail.

The Marquis Mario Incisa della Rocchetta died in 1983.