Old Vine Festival, the oldest vine in the world

For the eleventh year in a row, the The Old Vine Festival is prepared in the honour of the Old Vine, the oldest in the world and is the main festival in the cycle of events celebrating the Vine, from pruning to the celebration of St. Martin’s Day. The Old Vine is Maribor’s greatest ethnographic site, which symbolises the rich wine culture of Maribor and Štajerska and is at the same time a starting and finishing point of wine roads, which intertwine the hilly wine growing district of the town.

The Festival will take place in Maribor between the 16th and 25th September and will host many activities with the height of the Festival being a festive grape harvest of the Old Vine. At the same time, the crowning of the new Slovene Wine Queen will take place and the old vinedresser of the city will hand over his tasks to his successor. The Festival which is visited by thousands of people every year offers many opportunities for the meeting of experts and amateurs, for entertainment and learning, for grown-ups and children, and for the body and soul.

Old Vine, the oldest vine in the world, is the oldest living specimen on our planet of a noble grape vine that still bears grapes. With an age of over 400 years it is registered in the Guinness Book of Records as the oldest vine in the world. It symbolises the rich wine culture of Maribor, Štajerska and Slovenia. Vine genetics experts in Paris also confirmed the authenticity of the age of the Old Vine, along with precise professional measurements by Slovene experts. The vine was planted at least 400 years ago, probably somewhat earlier. Its Methuselah state is also confirmed in paintings of Maribor dating from the years 1657 and 1681, which are kept in the Štajerska Provincial Museum in Graz. In the pictures the frontage of the house at Vojašniška ulica 8, built in the 16th century, can be clearly seen, and even then it was already lushly overgrown with today’s venerated Old Vine. Just as in those days the Old Vine still today clings to the trelliswork or “brajda”, as the wooden support is called in Štajerska.

Old Vine`s scions grow on almost all continents and in numerous places in Slovenia. Old Vine`s grape, the sort Žametovka or Modra kavčina is one of the oldest domesticated noble wine sorts in Slovenia. The 35 to 55 kg symbolic annual grape harvest is bottled in 2,5 dcl glass bottles, designed by the famous artist Oskar Kogoj, that represent a precious protocol gift - annually more than 100 bottles are filled.

Learn also about the wine-cultural highlights of Maribor and its surroundings:

- Take a walk along the river Drava embankment: visit the Old Vine, the queen of all vines, and the Old Vine House, on the frontage of which grows the Old Vine.
- The Old Vine House, a temple of wine tradition and culture: exhibition and wine tasting room, selling point and tourist information centre.
- Maribor`s wine underworld, wine cellars, bars, and museums: Vinag Wine Cellar, wine cellar Dveri-Pax, Meranovo Estate, Rožmarin Wine Bar, Maribor Wine Bar in Water Tower, Viticultural Museum Kebl.
- Wine roads: Maribor, Podpohorska, and Upper Slovenske Gorice wine-tourist road and The Trail of Archduke Johann intertwine over the hilly, wine growing surroundings of Maribor. Numerous wine shops and tourist farms offer excellent white sorts and Štajerska delights,
- Excellent, traditional wine and food of Štajerska.

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