But sometimes this particular character is apparent even in great Italian cabernet-based reds like the old Fiorano Rossos, made from the late 1940s through the early ’90s, by Alberico Boncampagni Ludovisi, the prince of Venosa, at his estate within the city limits of Rome, where he had planted cabernet and merlot. The structure in these wines was provided, in the Italian fashion, by the acidity rather than the tannins. (French wines, by contrast, are more tannic.)

Where does this Italian character originate? From the soils? Selective breeding of grapes over centuries? Or might it be something else that we have not considered?

Welcome back to Wine School, where we like to examine the questions even if we don’t always arrive at satisfactory answers. Considering what we do not know is often more fascinating than what we do. And as much as we have learned about the science of wine, it has not given up all its mysteries. We can live with that.

Each month, we drink several examples of a particular wine, and then reconvene to ponder where the wines took us. This month was a little different. Instead of focusing on a specific category, we drank three entirely different Italian red wines, each made with a relatively obscure grape grown in a different part of the country.

The idea was to highlight the wealth of unfamiliar wines that come from all corners of Italy. This great diversity, not just from Italy but from much of the historic wine-drinking world, has made our current era a golden age for wine lovers.