Short answers, pulled from the story.
Ancient Rome’s expansion spread viticulture and winemaking to every part of the empire, laying the foundations for the wine industries of France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Spain. Roman merchants traded wine with Celtic and Germanic tribes before the military arrived, and Roman settlers planted vineyards in places like Bordeaux, the Mosel valley, and Burgundy that remain world-renowned wine regions today.
The Opimian vintage was the celebrated wine harvest of 121 BC, named for the consul Lucius Opimius who held office that year. It was remarkable for its abundant yield and unusually high quality, and some bottles from that vintage were still being enjoyed more than a century later.
The eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD destroyed the vineyards, ports, and warehouses of the Campanian coast, including the stores of the 78 AD vintage. Wine prices rose sharply, prompting the hurried planting of new vineyards nearer Rome and the conversion of grain fields to vines. The resulting wine surplus eventually depressed prices and contributed to a food shortage, leading Emperor Domitian to issue an edict in 92 AD ordering half the vineyards in Roman provinces to be uprooted.
Cato the Elder wrote the oldest surviving Latin prose work covering viticulture and advocated strict hygiene in winemaking. Columella’s 12-volume De re rustica described vine training, pruning, and pressing in precise detail. Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia ranked Rome’s first-growth vineyards and articulated an early concept of terroir, arguing that unique places produce unique wine.
Posca was a mixture of water and sour wine that had not yet turned to vinegar, used as the standard wine ration for Roman soldiers. The Corpus Juris Civilis codified a daily soldier’s ration of roughly a liter. It was low in alcohol and more acidic than finished wine, retaining some of wine’s aroma and texture.
Many Jewish views on wine, adopted by the early Christian movement, entered Roman religious life as Rome assimilated more cultures. The sacrament of the Eucharist involved wine, and Romans drew parallels between Bacchus and Christ, noting that both figures carried narratives featuring the symbolism of death and renewal. The Church eventually took over from Rome as the dominant influence in the world of wine in the centuries leading to the Renaissance.