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The numerous archeological vestiges attest the existence of the viticulture in Dobrudja since the period of the Greek colonies. Bas-reliefs, ceramics pottery, coins with images of grapes on the reverse dating back to the V – VI centuries BC have been discovered at Tomis,Callatis, Histria, Enisala, Aegysus, etc. The Romans gave a great impulse to the viticulture from these areas. Between 105-271 the Romans brought to this area new sorts and procedures in the viticulture technique practiced until then by the Getic-Dacians.
The history of the well-known Murfatlar vineyard begins on the place of the present day plantations of the Murfatlar Viticulture Research Station, the first vineyards witch you come upon you leave Constanza on your way
to Valul lui Traian village and Basarabi town. The historian M.D. Ionescu stated in this work “Dobrudja in the XX Century Threshold”, written more than 100 years ago (1904), that in 1887 the Murfatlar nursery was founded here, having a surface of 48200 sq.m., planted with bushes and vines which were meant to remove the drought effect.
After the invasion of the phylloxera insect and the destruction of the old vineyards, at Murfatlar nursery, in 1907, the first vine plantations were founded in an organized way, which where the property of the Ministry of Agriculture and of the Domains called “The Murfatlar Experimental Vineyard”. On the Antiphylloxera Service initiative within the Ministry of Agriculture and of the Domains, in 1911, at the proposal of the agronomist G. Nicoleanu and B. Brezeanu, about 11 hectares with the sorts Pinot gris and Chardonnays (8 hectares) and the sorts Clairette, Folle Blanche and Malvoisier (3 hectares) were planted here, the two specialists which were trained in France, finding the conditions from Murfatlar similar to the one in Champagne county – France (orography, climate, soil).
Between 1913 – 1916 years even a small center for producing sparkling wines, which was suggestively called “Ovidiu’s tear”, was founded here, but in time it has been proved that the real vocation of Murfatlar is the producing of natural liquorouse wines. During the period in between 1916-1939, the surface of the viticulture nursery comes to 28 hectares, and during 1939, the Viticulture Section of A.R.I.R. founded at Murfatlar the first comparative plantation with 10 wine sorts and 10 table sorts grafted each on 4 rootstocks.
In August 1942 by an order of the Ministry of Agriculture and of the Domains the nursery is transferred in the subordination of the Agronomic Research Institute of Romania (A.R.I.R.), and beginning with 1943, at the present days Experimental Viticulture Station was founded.
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