Brindisi
Cin cin!
Prosit!
À votre santé!
Cheers!
Slàinte!
Brindisi (the Italian word to say cheers) literally means “I bring it to you” or “I drink to your health”
A thousand ways to say it and one way to do it: cheers has always been one of the best moments of sharing.
Together with friends, family and colleagues all these situations are great for raising your glasses up. A cheers is something convivial, that brings happiness and lightens your mind and heart. A natural gesture for celebrating a special occasion or just at the beginning of a meal or during aperitif.
The gesture of raising glasses is universally known and comes with a complex and symbolically rich history behind it.
Brindisi was already a common practice in ancient Greece. In Homaro poems, gods and heroes were often presented during the act of drinking and cheering.
Also in ancient Greece there was the custom of honoring friends and wishing them luck by raising a glass of wine in their name.
From Greece these tradition passed to Rome where we can find lots of stories written by latin authors regarding the cheers. Some of them are pretty curious. From one of Marziale’s poems we know that romans used to drink as many “ciati” (a measurement that corresponds to five centiliters) as there were letters in the name of the person they wanted to honor.
In mediaval times the act of cheering dropped down because it was considered rude and all Christians should keep themselves away from it. Only in 500 did the tradition begin again and since then we haven’t stopped.
So let’s raise our glasses to the tradition that doesn’t get lost but is renewed.
To wine that unifies and to you who know how to appreciate it!