The Roman Wine Press and Pressing House in Piesport

During vineyard consolidation measures in May of 1985, when paths through the vineyards were being built, workers came across extensive portions of wall remains that were relatively intact – unfortunately, so intact that they were at first mistakenly deemed to have stemmed from modern times. It was only thanks to the intervention of the Reinhold Haart estate that archaeologists timely recognized what was at stake here, namely, the walls of an ancient Roman building – a fourth-century Roman grape pressing house.

The Roman facility at the foot of the Goldtröpfchen site dates from the 4th century and includes seven basins with stone floors made of limestone tiles. The basins of the press were large enough to handle the crop of a vineyard of 50 to 60 ha (123.5 to 148 acres) during the harvest in autumn. This is about equivalent in size to today’s Goldtröpfchen crop.

The large beam press (see picture) above the basins was reconstructed and could be reactivated in October 1992. Since then, during Piesport’s wine festival the second weekend in October, grapes have been pressed according to historical methods in the Roman pressing house.

One of the four cellars served as a "Fumarium" in which smoke could be introduced, thereby “aging” the wine early, as well as lending it a smoky flavour.