Hock is a British term for German

white wine White wine is a wine that is Fermentation in winemaking, fermented without undergoing the process of Maceration (wine), maceration, which involves prolonged contact between the juice with the grape skins, seeds, and pulp. The wine color, colou ...

. It sometimes refers to white wine from the Rhine region (specifically

Riesling Riesling ( , ) is a white grape variety that originated in the Rhine region. Riesling is an aromatic grape variety displaying flowery, almost perfumed, aromas as well as high acidity. It is used to make dry, semi-sweet, sweet, and sparkling ...

) and sometimes to all German white wine. The word ''hock'' is short for the obsolete word hockamore, an alteration of "Hochheimer", derived from the name of the town of Hochheim am Main in Germany. Over the years, hock-shaped bottles have come to signify sweet, cheap wine in general. The term seems to have been in use in the 17th century, initially for white wines (predominantly Riesling) from the

Rheingau The Rheingau (; ) is a region on the northern side of the Rhine between the German towns of Wiesbaden and Lorch, Hesse, Lorch near Frankfurt, reaching from the Western Taunus to the Rhine. It is situated in the German state of Hesse and is part ...

, but in the 18th century it came to be used for any German white wine sold in Britain, to convey some of the then very high prestige of Rheingau wine to (often much) lesser German wines. It seems probable that

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in January 1901. Her reign of 63 year ...

's visit in 1850 to Hochheim (in Rheingau) and its vineyards during harvest time contributed to the continued use of the term. Supposedly by HOCHheim becoming shortened to HOCH and the hard German CH becoming written as CK to aid English speakers in its pronunciation. By then, those Rheingau wines commanded high prices, on par with, and sometimes higher than, the best wines from

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( ; ; Gascon language, Gascon ; ) is a city on the river Garonne in the Gironde Departments of France, department, southwestern France. A port city, it is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the Prefectures in F ...

and

Burgundy Burgundy ( ; ; Burgundian: ''Bregogne'') is a historical territory and former administrative region and province of east-central France. The province was once home to the Dukes of Burgundy from the early 11th until the late 15th century. ...

, matching and sometimes exceeding them in prestige. There are many vineyards associated with Hocks, such as Hochheimer, Rüdesheimer, Marcobrunner and Johannisberger.

References

{{Reflist German wine Wine terminology Rheingau