Germany’s wine terminology

Germany is often accused of having the most confusing, cluttered wine labels, yet in truth many of them are quite beautiful, and contain a wealth of information. All one has to do is see past the occasional use of Olde Worlde script, and get to grips with a few words of German.

There is much information that can be gathered from a German wine label. Each of the labels shown here clearly declare the vintage, the grape (Riesling), and that the wine originates from the Mosel-Saar-Ruwer. Looking in particular at Fritz Haag's label, this tells us that the grapes were grown in the Juffer-Sonnenuhr vineyard around the town of Brauneberg. The label gives us a few other pieces of information, but there are two snippets worth concentrating on: the Pradikat, and the AP number.