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More than 5000 entries on the history, culture and life of Britain (published in 1993 by Macmillan, now out of print)
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port
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Red wine from the valley of the Douro in Portugal, fortified with brandy, which like the white *Madeira fulfilled an 18C British passion for sweet wines. The majority of the firms shipping port from the Portuguese harbour of Oporto (from which it gets its name) were established by British families and have British names. Roughly once every three years the wine is good enough for the shippers to declare a 'vintage'; the port of these years is bottled early, matures slowly in the bottle, and is referred to by the name of the shipper and the year of the vintage.
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The wine of other years, known as wood port, matures more rapidly in wooden casks. The best of the wood port, left to a considerable age, becomes pale and is called 'tawny'. The rest is ordinary port, sometimes known as ruby port, which in the early 20C was a favourite winter drink in British pubs.
Vintage port has traditionally been much drunk in aristocratic and academic circles after dinner, with a certain degree of ceremony – in particular the taboo that the decanter must circulate in a clockwise direction. White port, relatively rare and in colour much like sherry, is made from white grapes and is drunk as an aperitif.
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