The VDP.GROSSE LAGE® MARCOBRUNN follows 700 metres of the old country road between Erbach and Hattenheim just a small distance away from the Rhine River. The 7.1 hectare vineyard is completely south facing and lies at 90 to 100 metres a.s.l. The soil is comprised of tertiary marl and deep loess loam with mica content. Parts of the soil are highly calcareous. Subterranean water availability is quite good and vines benefit from this, particularly in hot and dry years. This GL is planted mostly with Riesling.
History: Before the year 1200, this site was referred to as “Markenburne” and from 1275 as “Markenborne”. This likely comes from the word “Marka”, which meant border. A “Brunnen” or “spring” is located on the border between Erbach and Hattenheim. When the people of Erbach encased the spring in a neoclassical construction in 1810, they engraved it at the top with “Marcobrunnen Gemarkung Erbach”. On the other side, the people of Hattenheim countered with the inscription “So is just and so shall it be. For Erbach the water and for Hattenheim the wine!” Numerous dignitaries have visited the site throughout the ages, among them the third US President Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), the Shakespeare translator August Wilhelm Schlegel (1767-1845), the German writer and statesman Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), and the writer Theodor Fontane (1819-1898). Fontane commented on the wine, “It is miraculous what blows the heart can bear, when each stroke is parried with a bottle of Marcobrunn.”