March 27th-Tribidrag (Zinfandel/Primitivo)

Tribidrag is the oldest and original Croatian name for Primitivo or Zinfandel. Each grape was long believed to be its own variety. In 1975, a researcher at UC Davis was able to confirm Primitivo and Zinfandel were the same grape. There was still a widely held supposition that Primitivo/Zinfandel originated in Croatia. In the late 70s, a plant pathologist went to Croatia and took cuttings of a Plavac Mali vine, but later found that it was genetically different. Unfortunately, rumors had already spread that Plavac Mali was the same, so some had already begun labeling it under the more well known name, Zinfandel. This led to what became known as ‘Zinquest’ in Croatia. In 1998, legendary Napa winemaker, and native Croatian, Mike Grgich worked in collaboration with UC Davis and University of Zagreb to sort out Zinfandel’s history. The group collected nearly 150 samples of Plavac Mali from along the Dalmation coast and found none matched Zinfandel. After these failures, they accepted samples of potential suspects until they finally found an identical match in 2001. The match was locally known as Crljenak Kaštelanski (the red from Kaštela). In 2002, more was found under the name Pribidrag in the village of Svinišće, south of Split, growing in an old lady’s garden. Upon linking them all genetically, it was noted the first historical mention of Tribidrag dates back to at least the 15th century. Plavac Mali was determined to be an offspring of Tribidrag and another Dalmation variety. After further research, some questions have arisen about the Croatian origin of Tribidrag, and some believe the topic is not yet settled. There were subsequent claims that a genetic match was also located in Hungary then imported to Germany. Some plantings have also been located in Montenegro, where it is occasionally confused with the grape Vranac. The oldest historical mentions remain those in Croatia, so to date, Tribidrag is still considered the original name.