La chiarificazione del vino ed il filtro olandese Carpenè.
€236,95 EUR
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€236,95 EUR
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An Italian pamphlet on wine filtration that doubles as hardware catalogue
Mendola, Antonio
La chiarificazione del vino ed il filtro olandese Carpenè.
1885, Milano (Milan), Agenzia Enologica Italiana
First Edition
€236,95 EUR
Sale price
€236,95 EUR
Regular price
Overview
In 8vo. Pp. 13, [3]
First edition of Mendola's technical and promotional treatise on wine clarification by baron Antonio Mendola of Favara, written in 1881 and published in Milan in 1885 by the Agenzia Enologica Italiana, supplier of equipment to the rapidly modernizing Italian wine industry. Its subject is the Filtro Olandese Carpenè, a mechanical wine filter associated with the pioneering Conegliano oenologist Antonio Carpenè. Mendola presents clarification as more than a matter of appearance: limpidity is connected with preservation, ageing, commercial value, and the ability of wine to travel. Against traditional artificial fining with egg white, isinglass, blood, and other substances introduced directly into the wine, he advocates mechanical filtration as a cleaner intervention, describing his own practical experiments with the Carpenè apparatus. The pamphlet reflects the close relationship between scientific instruction and commercial innovation in post-Unification Italian oenology.
Inside the book
The pamphlet opens with an encomium to purità assoluta (absolute purity), treating limpid wine as a visual, commercial, and preservative virtue. Mendola traces clarification from the Greek and Roman geóponoi and poets to the Dutch process. Its polemical center is a rejection of chiarificazione artificiale (artificial fining), including egg white, ox blood, isinglass, albumin, clay powder, and Appert derivatives, on the grounds that these substances remain in prolonged chemical contact with the wine. Mendola instead describes his own trial of the filter apparatus, undertaken after receiving instructions from Ottavio Ottavi of Casale. The filter consists of a perforated copper or tinned upper cylinder and a slightly conical wooden vessel below. Following the text is a two-page extract from the Agenzia Enologica Italiana's 1885 equipment catalogue, which illustrates the apparatus and offers for purchase, with prices, several versions of the Carpenè filter, replacement bags, fittings for converting existing cellar vessels, and a Carpenè sulphuring stove, turning this modest pamphlet into an unusually tangible picture of the commercial infrastructure surrounding the modern Italian cellar.
Condition
Original wrappers, with traces of an old horizontal fold throughout. The fold has developed into a short tear at the outer margin, affecting the entire pamphlet. General wear to the wrappers, particularly at the spine. Good.
Dimensions (inches): 9 x 6 1/2 x 1/8
Why La Fenice likes it
Scientific essay or sales pitch? Mendola argues against putting foreign substances into wine in favor of the cleaner intervention of mechanical filtration; turn the page, and the apparatus is illustrated, priced, and ready to order. A wonderfully tangible snapshot of the moment the Italian cellar began filling with modern technology.
About the author
Antonio Mendola (1828-1908), Baron of Favara, Sicily, trained as an ampelographer under Alexandre-Pierre Odart, bred grape varieties from his own vineyards (including an 1869 cross named for Conegliano's G. B. Cerletti), and briefly corresponded with Charles Darwin in 1879-80.
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