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Above: In February of this year, Tracie P and I visited the village of Rolle, which lies nearly equidistant from Valdobbiadene and Conegliano in the heart of Prosecco country. Photo by Tracie P.

As the Italian Grape Name Pronunciation project has expanded to Appellations, I couldn’t think of a more mispronounced appellation and Italian toponym than Valdobbiadene. Despite the immense popularity of Prosecco Conegliano Valdobbiadene in this country (due, in no small part IMHO, to the fact that the grape name and appellation name Prosecco is relatively easy for Anglophones to pronounce), consumers and wine professionals rarely know how to pronounce Valdobbiadene correctly. When Prosecco producer Matteo Bisol visited Austin the other day, I seized the opportunity to film him pronouncing Valdobbiadene, Conegliano, Prosecco (the appellation and grape name), and Glera (a synonym for Prosecco, now favored by producers of the still relatively new Prosecco DOCG).

BTW, the toponym Valdobbiadene (a village) is a cognate of valle (valley) and the toponymic adjective Dubla(n)dino (from Duplavilis), which in turn comes from the hydronym Plavis, the ancient name of the Piave river. Thus, Valdobbiadene means valley of the Piave river.*

* You’ll note that in my transliteration of Valdobbiadene, I report only one b. This is due to the fact that the people of the Veneto do not pronounce double consonants. In standard Italian, the correct transliteration is VAHL-dohb-BEE’AH-deh-neh.