Ancient Greece and wine importance. Records inscribed on tablets in Linear B include details of wine, vineyards and wine merchants, as well as an early allusion to Dionysus, the Greek god of wine. Greeks embedded the arrival of winemaking culture in the mythologies of Dionysus and the cultural hero Aristaeus. Early remnants of amphoras show that the Mycenaeans actively traded wine throughout the ancient world in places such as Cyprus, Egypt, Palestine, Sicily and southern Italy. As the Greek city-states established colonies throughout the Mediterranean, the settlers brought grapevines with them and were active in cultivating the wild vines they encountered. Sicily and southern
Name of Greece Name of Greece The name of Greece differs in Greek compared with the names used for the country in other languages and cultures, just like the names of the Greeks. The ancient and modern name of the country is "Hellas" or "Hellada" (; in polytonic: ), and its official name is the Hellenic Republic "Helliniki Dimokratia". In English, however, the country is usually called Greece, which comes from the Latin "Graecia" (as used by the Romans) and literally means 'the land of the Greeks'. The English name "Greece" and the similar adaptations in other languages derive from the Latin name