Talk:Tokaj

And of course the Great Migration of Peoples as it is normally understood did not end in 900, certainly not in this region. Basic history ...Juro 16:58, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Juro, you were the one who first mentioned the Great Migration of Peoples in ref to the 5th century. But I checked the Wikipedia article and it states "The second phase, between 500 and 900 AD...." If that is wrong, I suggest you change it there. My reference to the Magyars bringing grapes was not my own opinion - it was from the book I referenced at the bottom of the article. Its only one reference, so I'm not going to rely on it...Scott


 * OK, I'll check the Migration article later ...Juro 18:41, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

OK, so I forgot to add the ref to this article as well as the Tokaji one...

History of Tokaj
Juro,

You wrote the following comment re your editing: "Anonymous was an example, not a proof - why should he invent this additional info ?; it is ridiculous to believe that nomadic fighters who settled there for some 4 years initially brought grapes..."

I'm really disappointed by these comments; they are not only incorrect, but seem to show a strong degree of anti-Hungarian bias. As I will see by my additions to the article, the Magyars already had a long tradition of wine-making before they reached the Carpathian Basin. Numerous primary sources dating back to the 5th century AD mention extensive vineyards maintained by Hungarians. In addition, there is strong etymological evidence for the Hungarians having acquired wine-making techniques from Turkic-speaking peoples.

Regarding your other additions to the article: yes, there is evidence for wine-making in the Tokaj region from Roman times (specifically, a petrified grape dating to the end of the 4th century AD has been found in Erdőbénye). However, there is, as far as I am aware, no evidence for viticulture in the region when the Magyars arrived at the end of the 9th century; this is a topic only for speculation. Slovaks were certainly involved in viticulture in the northern Zemplen region (ie present-day Slovakia) by the late medieval period, so it is certainly possible that they had a tradition of viticulture dating back to the 5th century AD. Maybe you could expand on this - from whom did the Slovaks acquire viticulture, what is the evidence for a "boom" in viticulture after the arrival of the Slavs? In any case, evidence for Slovak viticulture prior to the 10th century in the southern Zemplen region (ie Tokaj-Hegyalja) is lacking.

At this point, it is time to create a separate article for the Slovakian wine region of Tokaj (which after all, is a different region to Tokaj-Hegyalja). If you want to contribute positively to Wikipedia content on the subject of wine, I suggest that you write something about Slovakian wines and wine regions, as there is currently a complete lack. Personally, I'm very interested in Slovakian wine (and I often try it on my frequent trips to Prague, and less frequent trips to Bratislava). I do have a book on the wine of Moravia and Slovakia, but I can't access it at the moment. Scott Moore 09:50, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I am (among other fields) an expert in history, not in wine. So I am ready to learn, no problem. If you are going to argue with "wine books" you will have to give me time to go to a library a find a corresponding Slovak book. (1)But generally, the statement was that they BROUGHT (not had) the wine during a phase when they were launching (constant) looting raids to  Europe and when they knew they would not remain in the Tokaj region - they came in 896 and left that area to settle at the Balaton in 900/901. They came back to the Tokaj area only much later. (2) There is certainly no anti-Hungarian bias with me, I have contributed much to Hungary-related articles here since I understand Hungarian. But there is the opposite bias with you (probably caused by an extensive use of Hungarian non-scientific sources only) as I can see from your changes in the other articles, some of which would not be done even by Hungarian (real) historians nowadays. (3) The Slovak region is NOT a separate wine region - unless you are claiming that the Hungarian region "by coincidence" ends exactly at the state border between Slovakia and Hungary. The region was one region throughtout centuries and only became separated in 1918. But of course, you can create two articles. I hope you are not going to argue with the seemingly different Hungarian name. (4) The Slavs/Slovaks simply continued the viticulture that started in the 4th century. Its that simple. (5) I would like to see the ethymological "evidence" for the acquisition of a technique from Turkic speaking peoples given that the following point (5) holds and even the term Turkic peoples is disputed (5) The Hungarians were involved in viticulture in the 5th century?? - it is not sure where exactly they where and who they were before 800 (although there are several theories) and your source is claiming to know what activity they were involved in the 5th century?? Science ends here and legends start...Juro 15:05, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

1) I'm not arguing that the Hungarians brought viticulture within a 4-year period into the Tokaj region. I haven't mentioned a timescale because all that is sure is that the Magyars were familiar with viticulture long before they entered the Carpathian basin, and that by the 11th century they had established viticulture in a number of the present-day wine regions of Hungary. For most of the wine regions west of the Danube (here I mean Transdanubia in modern-day Hungary), there is archeological evidence for continued cultivation since Roman times (so obviously the Magyars didn't introduce viticulture to these). However, this evidence is lacking for other wine regions.
 * I will come back to this ...

3) My argument for the Slovak Tokaj being a separate wine region, is that (from the sources I have found on the Web) it comprises 22 communities (another source mentions 7 towns) and close to 1000 hectares. However, only two communities are listed in historical sources as belonging to the Tokaj wine region. I know that the historical Tokaj wine region was split between Hungary and Slovakia, but the present Tokaj region in Slovakia doesn't seem to match up to the part of the historical one which went to Slovakia. Maybe the EU documentation on the Tokaj PDO will illuminate this issue, but it hasn't been posted on the EU Website yet.
 * This is what Hungary has been claiming since 1958 (only since 1958!), but Hungarian documents from the time before 1918 are claiming the opposite - it is even quite probable that the Slovak hills are the original Tokaj region (according to Slovaks).

4) "Slavs/Slovaks simply continued the viticulture that started in the 4th century . Its that simple." OK but what the evidence for this? Ie what is the evidence for 'continuous viticulture?
 * The sources do not go into such details (I'll come back to this), but again a Hungarian has written a book in German on Hungarian wine before 1958 and he himself was claiming this there (just like Anonymus)...

5) I didn't refer to "Turkic" peoples, but rather "Turkic-speaking". I know that there is a dispute within the linguistic community about whether the Turkic sub-group of languages belongs to an Altaic family. However, there is no dispute about the Turkic languages being a related group. The evidence is that the Hungarian language has assimilated a stock of vocabularly related to viticulture from Turkic languages, which dates Hungarian involvement in viticulture to a period when they were interacting with Turkic-speaking peoples. I'm not going to go into the issues around comparative linguistics here as you may well me more familiar with this than I am (I'm not an expert, I'm just interested in linguistics), but I accept the premise that inheriting a stock of vocabularly is strong evidence for a people being engaged in the processes related to that vocabularly. Scott Moore 16:35, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)
 * This is not so important, but the dispute is about whether there is a Turkic group at all. The word "Turkic" languages/peoples etc. does not even exist in German, Czech, Slovak and I am sure in many other languages - you will not find it in normal encyclopedias or dictionaries (apart from really very specialized texts)...Juro 01:54, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)