The Taurasi DOCG, one of the main Campania red wines, takes the name of the homonym city in the upper Calore valley, an important centre of Samnium first, and then a Roman one.
It was precisely in imperial times that in the fertile territory of the Taurasia, under the dominion of Augustus’ second wife, Livia Drusilla, the cultivation of the vitis hellenica was started, in the luxuriant vines mentioned by Titus Livius. The foundation of the new city of Taurasi around the castle happened in Lombard period and with the Normans a period of considerable growth arrived and of increasing power on the surrounding area. The urban development characterised the life of the city in the following centuries, with the construction of churches and noble palaces which identity the beautiful historic centre of Taurasi. But it is to its agriculture products of excellence that the city owes its fortunes: in addition to the famous wine of the same name, the production of which it shares with other sixteen Irpinia municipalities, there is also the refined DOP extravirgin olive oil “Irpinia-Colline dell’Ufita”, another special gift from the fertile Irpinia land.
