A very brief history of Port :

Although the Duoro has been widely planted since the 1600's it originally only produced normal non-fortified wines, which were often extremely harsh and of poor quality.

Then in 1678 the British declared war on France and blockaded French ports which lead to an immediate shortage of wine, and since the British have always been an ally of Portugal they naturally turned to Portugal for their wine needs, establishing trading companies in Oporto to ship the wines back to England.

Under the Methuen Treaty of 1703 in reciprocation for the purchase of cloth by Portugal England agreed to lower Import Duties on Portuguese wines than those of France or Germany, which naturally made Port better value for money than wines from other countries, and hence paved the way for the increased Port imports and the expansion of the the UK Port trade.

How what we now know as 'Port' actually came to be is still a mystery :
- the wine shippers in Portugal originally added a couple of buckets of Brandy to the wine in order to stabilise it during the long sea journey back to England. And it is suggested that in order to speed up the shipping process the shippers started adding the Brandy earlier and earlier in the process until they started adding it during the fermentation.
- or, a story is told of a Liverpool merchant who sent his sons to Portugal in the 1670's to find a source of wine. In the Duoro valley they came across an abbot in a monastery in Lamego who was adding the Brandy during the fermentation process to increase the alcholic content.

Either way someone invented the great idea of adding Brandy during the fermentation process, which stops the development of the wine whilst it is still sweet and fruity, (and naturally strong due to the extra added Brandy).

In 1727 Warre's were instrumental in bringing the British Port Shippers together into an association which was called the 'Factory House'. The purpose was to increase bargaining power with the growers. After only a few years however it failed to meet it's original purpose but in the 1800's became a typical English Club with exclusive membership. It still stands today over 200 years later.

In the 1730's scandal hit the Port trade as some producers and shippers started adding sugar and elderberry juice to the wines instead of Brandy in order to reduce costs. To solve the various allegations and complaints the Marquis de Pombal stepped in and created the Old Wine Company which had extensive powers to regulate production of Port.

Not only could the Old Wine Company regulate the quantities produced, and fix the minimum and maximum prices, but also pass exclusive and final judgement on all disputes. These far reaching powers effectively ended the British monopoly on Port.

In 1756 the Old Wine Company also demarcated the growing region for Port, and as a result ALL of the vineyards and elderberry plantations outside of the demarcated region were destroyed. The Douro valley was the first officially demarcated wine appelation.

Everything was going smoothly until in 1878 the phylloxera louse came to the Douro. The growers had little choice but to graft their vines onto American rootstock to resist the phylloxera. After this major change there were fewer Vintages declared but they were immensely better. There are still a very small number of un-grafted vineyards remaining today, (notably those owned by Quinta do Noval), though Port from these vines command stratospheric prices.

And so it remains until today.