'Cinque Rose di Negroamaro'
Staff Writer - September 11, 2007
 A novel 'to be drunk' by Antonio Massara about the history of Leone de Castris' Cinque Rose (Five Roses) rosè wine label.
Written by Antonio Massara, commissioned by Piernicola Leone de Castris, and edited by Enotime, the novel narrates how the historic Five Roses label, produced by the Leone de Castris Estate, was born.
The 100,000 copies of the 256-page book that have been printed will be distributed free to all Five Roses wine lovers.
The story begins with Piero, the grandfather of the current owner of the estate. Piero was a lawyer and an exceptional entrepreneur who succeed in turning the endless difficulties encountered in the production of quality wines during one of the bloodiest period of the Italian history: the armistice of September 8, 1943, to his advantage.
 In 1943, Piero succeeds in producing an excellent and innovative wine dedicated to a new generation of consumers in the occupied Apulia region, the heel of the Italian boot, among airborne bombings, super-powerful generals and black market racketeering. By so doing, he paves, the way to export expansion once peace is established.
The story spans three generations and brings the reader to this day. This is a novel "to be drunk", as it keeps the wine-loving reader's interest piquet with its stories of vineyards and wines.
Leone de Castris
In 1665, Duke Oronzo Arcangelo de Castris, Count of Lemos, establishes a winery in the small hamlet of Salice Salentino, on the very spot where a modern crushing and processing plant today stands.
Already back then, several large estates located in the surroundings were planted mainly with vineyards and olives. Around the year 1800, the de Castris family establishes first marriage ties with the family of Leone Plantera, and in 1925 the ties are further tightened when Piero Leone Plantera marries Donna Lisetta de Castris.
 Piero and Lisetta Leone de Castris started a new period in the history of the old winery, by replacing the older vineyards, rearranging the estate management, and deciding to add a bottling plant to the expanding winemaking business. The Five Roses, which is the very first rosè wine bottled in Italy, is launched in 1943 and the Salice red wine in 1954. Thanks in great part to the estate's work, the DOC Salice Salentino is established in the early seventies.
At the end of the 1960s the general management is taken over by Salvatore Leone de Castris, son of Piero and Lisetta, who contributes to a great extent to the winery's further expansion on the international markets. In the eighties, his son Piernicola joins the company, in charge of the sales department first, and of general management from the late 1990s.
Antonio Massara is a marketing writer for several Sicilian wineries, for which he promotes the brand and oversees self-promotion. In this book he opened his creative vein. He has written three novels and published several short stories, as well as well as a series of ikonovels.
Enotime is the organization founded by wine journalists Elisabetta Fezzi and Fabrizio Penna, who have been writing about quality Italian wines for 20 years. They created the format and edited the novel. They publish the web magazine Enotime.
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