DOCG
One name holds the region's top tier: Aglianico del Vulture Superiore, the volcano's long-aged flagship.
Basilicata · IGT · Regional umbrella
Basilicata IGT The Regional Umbrella PGI for Lucanian Wine
Basilicata IGT is the regional umbrella that signs wines from across Lucania, from the volcanic Vulture to the Matera hills. It covers white, red, rosé, frizzante, novello and passito bottlings. It also allows single-grape labels for any authorised grape except Aglianico and Montepulciano. Those two are kept by the Aglianico del Vulture DOC and DOCG.
6
Wines
£11-£23
Price range
4
Retailers
Decode the label
Where this label sits
Three levels of Italian wine law, read through Basilicata's own denominations.
DOC
Four DOCs cover the serious ground: Aglianico del Vulture, Matera, Terre dell'Alta Val d'Agri and Grottino di Roccanova.
IGT
Basilicata IGT catches everything outside those lines, and it is Aglianico-led as often as not: declassified lots, young-vine cuvées and the experiments.
You are hereBasilicata does not contain Aglianico del Vulture Superiore, Aglianico del Vulture and Grottino di Roccanova. They sit in the same territory and answer to their own rulebooks. A producer inside any of them may still choose the regional label for a given wine, which makes the level a decision taken wine by wine, not a rank an estate holds.
What DOCG, DOC and IGT mean in Italian law is set out once, in Italian wine zones explained.
What is Basilicata IGT?
Basilicata IGT was created by Italian ministerial decree on 3 November 1995. Provvedimento Ministeriale changes refined it in May and July 2018. It sits below Aglianico del Vulture DOC, the higher Aglianico del Vulture Superiore DOCG, Terre dell'Alta Val d'Agri DOC, Matera DOC and Grottino di Roccanova DOC. That gives Lucanian growers a regional-scale label. It covers the wines those tighter zones leave out.
The territory runs across both provinces. Three landscapes shape the wine. On the Apennine spine, height and limestone keep acidity high in the reds. The Fossa Bradanica is a clay basin, and it softens the same grapes. The Apulian foreland near Matera is drier and warmer. It is friendlier to whites and rosati. Mount Vulture is an extinct volcano on the Campanian border. Its basalt soils are what make Aglianico del Vulture so distinctive. Most IGT reds lean on Vulture-grown Aglianico. That happens when the producer wants a quicker-drinking wine, outside the DOC rules.
In practice the IGT does three jobs. It carries international grapes that fall outside the DOC framework: Merlot, Cabernet, Chardonnay and Syrah. It carries declassified Aglianico from the Vulture estates, when the producer wants it drunk younger. And it carries traditional rosati and passito bottlings. Family wineries in Roccanova, Venosa and the Materano hills make those in tiny volumes. Basilicata producers active in the IGT include Cantine del Notaio, Paternoster, Elena Fucci, Donato D'Angelo, Bisceglia and Re Manfredi (Terre degli Svevi).
Common questions about Basilicata IGT
Basilicata IGT (Indicazione Geografica Tipica) is the regional umbrella PGI for wines made anywhere in Basilicata. It covers both the Potenza and Matera provinces. It takes in whites, reds, rosés, frizzante and passito bottlings. It also allows single-grape labels for almost any authorised local grape.
The rules leave Aglianico and Montepulciano out of single-grape labels. Aglianico-only wines must use Aglianico del Vulture DOC or Aglianico del Vulture Superiore DOCG. A wine labelled Basilicata IGT can use Aglianico in a blend. It cannot be sold as a single-grape Aglianico under the IGT label.
The IGT is the broadest and most open tier. The DOC and DOCG zones are smaller and stricter. Those are Aglianico del Vulture DOC and DOCG, Matera DOC, Terre dell'Alta Val d'Agri DOC and Grottino di Roccanova DOC. They have shorter grape lists and tighter ageing rules. The IGT is where producers put international grapes. It also takes faster-drinking declassified reds, frizzanti and passiti.
It was approved by Italian ministerial decree D.M. 03.11.1995. That was published in Gazzetta Ufficiale 267 on 15 November 1995. It was then amended in May and July 2018. Those changes refined the grape list and the yield rules.
Bianco, Rosso, Rosato, white frizzante, red frizzante, rosé frizzante, Novello rosso, Passito Bianco and Passito Rosso. Each can also be made as a single-grape wine, under the 85 percent rule. That applies to permitted grapes other than Aglianico and Montepulciano.
The rules cap grape-to-wine yield at 80 percent for the still and frizzante types. The cap is 50 percent for Passito Bianco and Passito Rosso. That lower figure reflects the weight the grapes lose in the partial drying step.
Many of the Vulture's flagship estates use the IGT for their younger or international cuvées. They include Cantine del Notaio, Paternoster, Elena Fucci, Donato D'Angelo, Bisceglia and Re Manfredi (Terre degli Svevi). Smaller wineries around Matera and Roccanova also bottle traditional rosati and passiti under the IGT.
Permitted grapes
Primary varieties
Montepulciano
Greco
Sangiovese
Aglianico
Primitivo
Aleatico
Merlot
Fiano
Moscato Bianco
Bombino Nero
Bombino Bianco
Trebbiano Toscano
The territory
The whole region, and what sits inside it
Everything drawn here can also, or instead, carry the Basilicata IGT label.
6Denominations share it
37Basilicata wines live
The territory is the administrative region, nothing tighter. Every stricter denomination on this map is drawn inside that same line, which is why a grower in one of them can bottle under either name in the same harvest.
None of these zones belongs to Basilicata IGT. They sit in the same territory and answer to their own rulebooks.
The parent region
Basilicata
Italy's smallest southern producer, where Aglianico ripens late on the volcanic cones of Mount Vulture and Matera's tufa cellars age the country's most under-priced age-worthy reds.
37 wines
·
6 denominations
Explore the Basilicata guide
37 wines
6 denominations
Wine styles
What’s bottled under Basilicata IGT
An umbrella of this size covers every style of still and sparkling wine. Each link below opens a filtered listing.
Selection
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A taste of Basilicata IGT
Editorially selected bottlings. 6 from 6.
1 retailer
Basilicata Rosato Le Ralle Alovini
Basilicata
1 retailer
£10.95
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1 retailer
Greco Basilicata Le Ralle, Alovini
Basilicata
1 retailer
£11.50
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1 retailer
'Pipoli' Greco Fiano Vigneti del Vulture
Basilicata
1 retailer
£15.90
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1 retailer
Basilicata IGT L'Atto Cantine del Notaio
Basilicata
1 retailer
£15.90
£16.74
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1 retailer
Basilicata IGT Bianca degli Svevi Re Manfredi
Basilicata
1 retailer
£16.60
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1 retailer
Basilicata IGT Il Rogito Cantine del Notaio
Basilicata
1 retailer
£22.30
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Related denominations in Basilicata
Sibling appellations that share Basilicata’s soil and sky.
